Beacon Disassembled
by Cerberus32
Summary: The time has finally come, after months of preperation the Vytal Festival is about to begin. With the knowledge we have of the events about to take place, will we have the power to alter the course of history, or will we have to go our seperate ways?
1. Chapter1

**Hey guys, just a quick note before we begin the story. As you all know I use the app for writing and publishing my stories, and as most of you know sometimes it doesn't work all that well, like right now it won't let me space the words when I put chapter name so I'll put the chapter names before the first text for each chapter until the problem is resolved if ever. Now without further ado, let's begin.**

**Great Responsibility**

Okay let's do this one last time, my name is Carlos Ortiz, I was given the opportunity to save an alternate world from a dark future and for the past two semesters I have been this dimensions one and only Spider-Man, I'm pretty sure you know the rest. After accepting the offer my brother and myself were transported to Remnant, we took part in the initiation test, became students at Beacon, I fell in love, helped save the city a few times, went to the school dance, fought a mech and some Grimm, and I did this...

( Spider-Man 3 dance)

Okay not really, trust me I actually couldn't bring myself to do it, even though I was alone in my dorm I just couldn't. Even if this situation I'm in is completely crazy I still love being Spider-Man, like a lot of us it's always been my dream to be like my hero and now I get to experience it first hand with the help of the people closest to me. I wish I could be as happy as I want to be about this, but sadly I know that things are going to get very serious from here on out and I cannot afford to screw up now. Why you ask, well it's simple really, it's almost time for the Vytal festival.

One week, that's how long we have left until the Vytal festival begins, and with that the tournament that brings together all four huntsman academies and their students to see just how far they've pushed themselves to grow stronger. This is also how long the students were given time off from classes so they can relax or in the case of those who are competing the time they need for some last minute training. As far as both Jonathan and I are concerned it doesn't look like we'll be competing which makes sense when you consider the facts, right now we are the only two person team not just in Beacon but also in any of the known academies across the kingdoms. Not only that but Jonathan has been spending as much time as possible helping upgrade the security system beneath Beacon to help keep Amber safe, as for me I have been training like crazy to improve my skills so if the outcome doesn't change from what originally happened in the series than I needed to be ready to fight any of our enemies at a moments notice.

Right now I'm in the training hall going through a simulation program my brother upgraded to test my skills in combat, over the last several months the new program has helped the other students improve their skills and right now I had it set to a special training session designed specifically for me. The holographic enemies were set to randomly switch from any species of Grimm to any random enemy that has been pre-programmed into the system every few minutes. Not only that but I had it set to maximum difficulty and I was getting beaten up pretty good. I tend to be very stubborn sometimes and this was one of those times, for the past few days I have been constantly worried about what would happen in the next several days and I felt like I had to push myself to my very limits if I wanted a chance to keep my friends safe from harm. The images of what happened when Beacon fell kept repeating in my mind and I was desperate to try and stop it, Pyhrra and Penny dying that day, Yang accused of attacking a "defenseless" student as well as getting her arm sliced off by Adam, Cinder getting the remaining half of the Maidens power and Ozpin getting killed, there was just so much to lose and I was running out of time.

As I finally managed to destroy the holographic Ursai I was fighting it switched to a holo version of Kraven the Hunter, whenever I got to an enemy like this I ditched my weapons and fought using only my spider abilities, I wanted to be sure I wasn't relying heavily on my weapons and made sure I would be able to hold my own with or without them. As Kraven came at me with his daggers I rushed in and avoided his attacks while delivering a few of my own, so far I seemed to be doing okay, only he backed up and started using a crossbow with different arrow types to try and confuse me. Even if this was a simulation the settings I had on would definitely break a few of my bones if I wasn't careful and that's exactly how I wanted it, in this particular instance the arrows were designed to induce a feeling similar to being poisoned or paralyzed without having any lasting effects on my body. Just as I was about to get in close to punch Kraven in the face it switched into a holo Alpha Beowolf and it almost ripped my arm off if I didn't grab it's head and flipped over him while grabbing my swords. As I rushed in to cut my opponent down to size the images began repeating themselves only this time the screams of pain and suffering distracted me long enough for the hologram to slam into me and send me flying a few feet before the program shutdown. As I tried getting back up I felt the pain in my body intensify and to say I really pushed myself would be putting it lightly, everything hurt but right now I didn't care, I was about to repeat that program again only this time I was about to change the settings to make it so I would fight three enemies at once but I ended up passing out. As I awoke I saw Ms. Goodwitch rushing over to me as if I was in bad shape which was more than likely.

**Goodwitch: **Mr. Ortiz are you all right?!

**Carlos: **I think so.

**Goodwitch: **How long have you been here?

**Carlos: **I think since breakfast, that was around 8:30 I think?

**Goodwitch: **It's 4 p.m. right now, have you been training yourself that long?

**Carlos: **I'm not sure, I think I spent most of that time passed out.

**Goodwitch:** I can see that. Tell me, why are you pushing yourself so hard, normally I don't mind it when my students push themselves to become stronger but there is a difference between getting stronger and pushing yourself past your limitations that you end up damaging your body.

**Carlos: **I know, but if I don't do something about what we're up against then we're all in grave danger.

**Goodwitch: **True, but that's why you're all here. To train and prepare yourselves for whatever tomorrow holds.

**Carlos: **I just don't know if I have what it takes.

**Goodwitch: **We never do.

As she began walking away I still kept thinking about what will happen within the next couple days, I didn't want to lose what I gained in this world, what good would I be if I didn't push myself to protect what we have?

**Goodwitch: **Tell me, other than being asked by the Maidens to help our world, why is it that you do what you do out there as Spider-Man?

I looked at her in slight confusion and surprise. As I thought about it I realized that what I do as Spider-Man is absolutely crazy. Normally I would never be able to do half of what I can do now back home, but ever since we came here I felt that I had to live up to my promise as well as live up to the legacy of the power I was given. As the months went by what I felt then and what I feel right now, the answer was obvious.

**Carlos: **Aside from the Maidens, I feel that it's my destiny to use my gifts to aid those who can't protect themselves. Not only that but I don't want to put my friends in harms way, I know they can protect themselves but if I have the power to help them then I will do all that I can and more. Back home I learned that with great power, comes great responsibility. It's something I keep close to my heart and I will never abandon that belief.

She simply gave me a nod and continued walking away. As I was left alone again I was about to start up the training program only to feel a pair of arms hug around my body from behind and a familiar warmth spread throughout me.

**Carlos: **( sigh ) How much of that did you hear?

**Blake: **Something about great power and great responsibility. Honestly I couldn't agree more, it's too bad not everyone has that kind of mind set.

**Carlos:** ( I guess she didn't hear the part about the Maidens, hopefully I can keep it that way at least for a while longer. ) So tell me, why're you here?

**Blake: **Do I need a specific reason to be with my boyfriend?

**Carlos: **No not really, but I can tell that something's bothering you, what is it.

**Blake: **It's just... for the past few days you've become distant from the rest of us and I was starting to worry that you would end up doing what I did.

**Carlos: **( sigh ) I'm sorry. You're right, it's just... I have a bad feeling that something big is going to happen and I want to be sure that I am ready to handle whatever comes our way. I want to be strong enough to protect you and our friends.

**Blake: **I understand, and I appreciate it, just remember that you aren't alone, we have our friends and each other, so promise me that you'll slow down and take it easy for a bit.

**Carlos:** ( sigh ) Alright, you win.

**Blake: **Thank you. Come on we haven't spent time together for a while and you look like you could use some rest.

**Carlos: **What did you have in mind.

**Blake: **I was thinking the two of us could cuddle, maybe even take a nap together, that is until after you take a shower. I think you've trained more than enough for today.

**Carlos: **Heh heh, yeah that sounds fair. I'll meet you at your dorm in about 20 minutes.

**Blake: **Don't be late.

As I rushed to get a quick shower I ran into Jonathan sitting at a nearby bench just resting.

**Carlos: **I thought you were still working on upgrading the security system for Ozpin?

**Jonathan: **I was, but I've done all I could so it's up to us now to take care of the rest.

**Carlos: **Yeah, but what if we fail and people end up losing their lives because we couldn't stop it.

**Jonathan: **Have you forgotten who we are? We're team AVGR. If we can't protect the people of Remnant you can be damn sure we'll avenge them.

**Carlos: **You're right.

**Jonathan: **Of course I'm right. I'm a Stark, we're always right.

As I looked towards the statue in the courtyard I couldn't help but feel nervous about our odds of success, but no matter what we won't back down and we will continue to fight, for as long as it takes we will make it to the end.


	2. Chapter2

**Public Enemy**

24 hours. That's how much time we have until the Vytal festival starts. With every second that passes I end up getting more nervous and with good reason. I had to admit I wish I could spend more time getting prepared for what was to come, but I've done all I can, now I just had to hope and pray that we can make it through this together as a team. Right now Jonathan and I were eating lunch at the cafeteria going over final preparations for the festival to hopefully change whatever we could in the hopes of altering the timeline.

**Carlos:** Okay since you upgraded the security protecting Amber we need to go over anything else important that we need to look out for.

**Jonathan: **I agree, luckily I'm already three steps ahead and I know you'll appreciate what I've done.

**Carlos: **Alright, what've you got for me.

**Jonathan: **For starters, remember a few days ago when Pyhrra said she was feeling a little dizzy, that was because of me.

**Carlos: **What did you do?

**Jonathan: **The night before, I sent in a small drone into her dorm and I secretly injected nanotech into her bloodstream. Right now it's successfully coursing in her veins and will be ready to deploy during her fight with Cinder.

**Carlos:** Okay I get how it will help when she gets injured but what about Cinder's fire abilities, is your tech strong enough to avoid getting disintegrated?

**Jonathan: **Unfortunately no, but I came up with a back up plan for that. After studying the legends of the Maidens from what Ozpin told me as well as the info you gave me I developed a protocol that will activate in the presence of extreme heat.

**Carlos: **What kind of protocol?

**Jonathan: **The kind that will hopefully save Pyhrra's life in the end.

**Carlos: **I really hope so, there's just a lot at stake here and I don't want to lose any of our friends.

**Jonathan: **I know, but all we can do is be ready and hope for the best. Let's change the subject, did General Ironwood inspect the CCT building?

**Carlos: **Not sure, considering that communications are still going he either didn't find anything or just ignored my warning.

**Jonathan: **I can try looking into it but if I do I might end up activating that curse like yesterday.

**Carlos: **What happened yesterday?

**Jonathan: **I tried hacking into Cinder's scroll but before I could do anything I started suffocating. Guess we can't stop them from messing with the match ups during the tournament.

**Carlos: **Then we better stay alert. You can still try but if you feel like you might suffocate then stop immediately, understand.

**Jonathan: **No problem.

A few minutes later and teams RWBY and JNPR joined us and we just started talking about how much fun we're going to have during the festival and the tournament.

**Nora: **I can't wait for the tournament to start!!! So many people to fight, so many legs to break!!!!

**Ren:** Nora we've talked about this, no breaking the other teams legs.

**Nora: **Not even a little?!

**Ren:** No.

**Ruby: **I just can't wait to show everyone what team RWBY is capable of!

**Carlos: **You guys are going to be amazing out there, make sure you guys show them what Beacon can really do.

**Weiss: **What about you though, are the two of you going to compete?

**Jonathan: **We can't, we're the only two person team in any of the academies so it puts us at a disadvantage already.

**Carlos: **It's cool though, that just means I have more energy to cheer you guys on, especially my favorite kitten in the world.

**Blake:** T-thanks.

**Yang: **Awww is the kitten embarrassed of getting complimented by her boyfriend?

While the teasing continued I got a message on my scroll about an order I placed a month ago that was ready for pick up.

**Carlos:** (Awesome it's finally arrived.) Hey I gotta get going, I gotta pick something up in Vale so I'll see you guys later.

**Yang: **Hey can I join you?

**Carlos:** Huh?

**Yang: **Well we haven't hung out for a while so I thought now would be a good time.

**Carlos: **Oh, sure I don't mind. Anyone else want to come?

**Ruby: **I can't, Weiss agreed to give me some last minute training today to get ready for tomorrow.

**Jaune:** Same with us.

**Blake: **I actually can't, I'm working on something important and I wanted to finish it up before the festival begins since I won't have time once it starts.

**Jonathan: **You know me, my current project is almost ready so I can't.

**Carlos: **Okay, well take care then.

**Yang: **See ya later.

As Yang and I made it to the city the streets were full of people and vendors getting ready for tomorrow. Even if the festival hadn't officially begun everyone was still in a great mood.

**Yang: **This is so awesome, just look at everybody having a good time.

**Carlos: **Yeah, it's moments like this that you can really appreciate.

**Yang: **So what was it that you needed to pick up anyway?

**Carlos:** That is my little secret, but what I can tell you is that it's something for you and your whole team.

**Yang:** Now I'm really interested, come on tell me!

**Carlos: **Nope.

**Yang: **Please!

**Carlos: **Hmmm, Nope.

**Yang: **Please!

This went on for the next 10 minutes so let's skip to when we finally made it to our destination which just so happened to be a small jewelry shop.

**Yang: **Please!

**Carlos: **Nope.

**Yang: **Fine I'll stop asking.

**Carlos: **Good cuz we're already here.

**Yang: **What?!

**Carlos: **Hey do you mind waiting outside, I don't wanna spoil your surprise.

**Yang: **Aww really!

**Carlos: **Yes really.

**Yang: **Fine I'll wait, you're lucky you're my best friend.

**Carlos: **And you're lucky that you're cute.

**Yang: **Okay that's enough flirting, now get in there you big dork.

As I went inside I managed to find the owner of the shop and showed him my order which he brought out very quickly, he soon presented me with four white boxes each with a special necklace inside and he wrapped up each box with a ribbon and placed them in a bag for me. As I payed for my purchase which I hoped the girls liked, I turned around I noticed two guys trying to flirt with Yang and she was visibly annoyed.

**Yang: **What part of "leave me alone" didn't you understand?

**Guy 1: **Come on you don't really mean that do you?

**Guy 2: **Are you seriously hanging out with a loser like that guy in the store when you could be having fun with us?

**Yang: **That "loser" is my best friend, now take that back before I get really mad!

**Carlos: **I'd listen to her if I were you.

As they turned to get a good look at me the two guys tried sizing me up to intimidate me. If it wasn't for everything I went through the last few months I would've been afraid of them, now guys like them don't even worry me anymore.

**Guy 1: **Get lost loser, this chick's hanging with us now.

**Carlos: **Wow, if you refer to every girl as "chick" instead of their actual name than you guys must be really pathetic.

**Guy 2: **What was that?!

**Carlos: **Oh sorry did I say pathetic? I meant desperate.

Without another word the first guy tried punching me only for me to grab his fist and flip him onto his back, the second guy tried to run only for Yang to punch him in the gut and uppercut him.

**Carlos: **Let this be a learning experience for the two you, never mess with a huntsman and huntress.

As we left the two of them to wallow in their embarrassment Yang put her arm over my shoulder and we began walking into the city to check out some of the sights. As we spent the next several hours just hanging out I noticed a large group of people gathered around the area where Ironwood announced his new tech when we were doing our investigation.

**Yang:** I wonder what's going on, I can't see anything past this crowd.

**Carlos: **And it looks like we won't be able to get past them either.

**Yang: **Well... I wouldn't say that.

As I turned to Yang she pointed to a nearby building next to the crowd that would be the perfect place to see and hear what's going on without being spotted. After getting to the alley behind the building I held Yang as she grabbed onto me while she held onto the bag with her free arm as I crawled up the wall. Once we made it to the top we had a perfect view as General Ironwood made his way to speak.

**Ironwood:** People of Vale, before I begin I just want to say it is an honor and a privilege to be here once more in representing Atlas in this years Vytal tournament along with the students of our honored academy. They have spent countless hours devoted to their training to make it here today, however that is not why I called for this statement today. As many have noticed, criminal activity within the city has been on the rise, most notably because of Roman Torchwick as well as the White Fang. Now that Roman is in custody of the Atlas military there is no reason to fear of his influence corrupting this proud city...

**Yang:** Wow he must really like the sound of his own voice huh.

**Carlos: **Maybe. Still just cuz Roman is behind bars doesn't mean we can let our guard down just yet.

**Yang:** Why not? Like he said he's got the Atlas military keeping an eye on him so what is there to worry about?

**Carlos: **Trust me, it's not always that simple.

**Ironwood: **...but that doesn't mean we are 100% safe. We still have dangerous individuals loose within our borders, as such today I'm officially declaring an arrest warrant for the masked vigilante known as Spider-Man.

**Carlos/Yang: **WHAT?!

That simple statement alone was enough to cause confusion within the crowd, people kept asking why was Spider-Man a target for the military or where was the proof that I needed to be arrested.

**Ironwood: **For months now he has been taking it upon himself to uphold the law within his own hands. This is a job that is to be left to the police or local huntsman, his careless actions have needlessly put the lives of innocent civilians at risk, therefore the Atlas military forces are instructed to bring this vigilante to justice, we have been given full cooperation by Jacques Schnee himself to bring in Spider-Man by the end of the festival so that he may face punishment for his actions. Spider-Man if you're listening I promise you that I will personally bring you in myself if I must, your days are numbered and your time in this city has come to its end. As we speak my troops are currently patrolling the streets, we will find you and you will be removed, by force if necessary.

As the people kept asking questions I simply couldn't believe what was happening. I just became public enemy number one.

**Yang:** Carlos what's wrong, you're not moving, snap out of it!

**Carlos:** Y-Yang I... I gotta get you out of here.

**Yang: **What?!

**Carlos: **Come on let's go!

As we made it back down to the streets we were almost spotted by some soldiers that were already on the lookout for me. It seemed like there were soldiers almost everywhere we looked and it wasn't going to be easy getting back to Beacon without someone possibly suspecting me.

**Yang: **This is crazy, why is the General after you anyway?

**Carlos:** We can worry about that later, right now we have to find a way for me to get back to Beacon undetected.

**Yang: **Well we know swinging back isn't an option, and you can't just walk back since if they spot you they might notice your spinnerets or they'll ask to talk to you and you could get caught either way.

**Carlos: **Which leaves only one option.

**Yang: **Which is...

**Carlos: **If you can't go over, and you can't go through, you should try going under. I hate to say it but, I have to go through the sewers.

**Yang: **Ewwwww.

**Carlos:** I know it's not the best choice but it's all I have left. Listen just get back to Beacon and if the others haven't heard of this let them know immediately.

**Yang: **Okay but what do I do about your bag?

**Carlos:** Just take it and give it to your team, it should be easy for you to tell who gets what. Also make sure the guys on team CRDL don't try and call the General in case they want to reveal my identity.

**Yang: **Do you really think those guys know you're Spider-Man?

**Carlos:** No, but I humiliated them and I'm a spider faunus, they might just use this to get back at me. Just make sure they don't try anything funny.

**Yang: **You got it, good luck.

As we split up I looked behind me and found a manhole cover, once I made it down into the sewers I called Jonathan for help but I got JARVIS instead.

**JARVIS: **Good afternoon Mr. Ortiz, I'm afraid Mr. Stark is currently unavailable at the moment.

**Carlos: **That's fine, actually maybe you can help me, I need to get back to Beacon but I have to travel using the city's sewer system since Ironwood basically put a bounty on my head.

**JARVIS: **Yes we were all informed of the General's speech, rest assured your friends have been notified of the situation, but I must inform you that Ms. Belladonna is very worried about you.

**Carlos: **Honestly I'm not surprised. Just send me a route back to Beacon to my mask and I'll be on my way, oh and while your at it can you call Blake for me and have it connect to my mask as well.

**JARVIS: **Certainly, one moment please.

As I put my mask on I jumped to the ceiling of this place to avoid stepping in something nasty and not a moment later a map of the city sewage system came up on my masks heads up display with a path for me to follow, as I began crawling I soon got through to Blake ready to explain what the heck was going on.

**Blake: **Carlos are you okay?!

**Carlos: **Yeah don't worry I'm fine, or as fine as you can get traveling through the sewers.

**Blake: **We heard everything, Yang even called us to make sure we got the news. What's going on?!

**Carlos:** Not entirely sure, as far as I know the General has it out for me and I need to be more alert than usual.

**Blake: **Okay, okay, just promise me you'll make it back safe.

**Carlos:** I will, by the way has team CRDL tried to expose me as Spider-Man?

**Blake: **They did, whether or not they knew your identity they just wanted to get back at you but I managed to "convince" them otherwise.

**Carlos: **What do you mean by "convince" them.

**Blake: **Well... let's just say I borrowed an idea from Nora and that they'll barely recover in time for the tournament.

**Carlos: **Wow, and here I thought I couldn't fall in love with you even more.

**Blake: **Thanks. Listen I know you're trying not to get caught but can we just keep talking, I know you're capable of getting back safely but just hearing your voice is helping me stay calm right now.

**Carlos: **I don't mind, I like talking to you too. So how was your day...

After roughly an hour or so I safely got far enough away to catch a bullhead in time to get back to Beacon as I stayed on the roof so no one spotted me or suffered from my new scent.

**Carlos:** Okay Blake I should be in my room in about 5 minutes, let me get a decent shower first and I'll stop by your dorm.

**Blake: **Okay, and thanks for getting home safely.

As we hung up I wasted no time getting to my dorm as fast as possible, luckily Jonathan was already in the room and left the window open for me.

**Jonathan: **Glad you made it back without... oh brother you stink!!!!

**Carlos: **Tell me something I don't know, just let me grab a shower and then we'll head to the girl's dorm so I can explain.


	3. Chapter3

**Hero or Menace**

(Yang's pov)

I can't believe how this day turned out, at first it seemed like I would be able to have a good time with my best friend and just enjoy a simple relaxing day together. Instead we end up witnessing Ironwood proclaim that he is going to arrest Spider-Man by the end of the festival, if this is some kind of weird dream I would really like to wake up now. After getting back to the dorms I decided to just lay in bed for a bit while I waited for the others to come back, around 30 minutes passed before Ruby and Weiss came back into the room. This whole situation involving Carlos is just too crazy to be true. When we split up earlier I tried wrapping my head around why the General wanted to arrest him so much but nothing came to mind, I mean this is the guy who spends his time helping people around the city and his friend at school ( he even saved a hamster from a tree once and returned it to the little girl looking for him ), someone who will listen to whatever problems you may have, overall he's a great friend and yet the entire military is now searching for him.

**Ruby: **So is it really true? Is General Ironwood really serious about arresting Carlos?

**Yang: **Yeah. We were there when he made the announcement and we saw his soldiers patrolling the streets looking for him.

**Weiss: **I don't understand why this is happening, I know Carlos is trying to help the city and that he has done a good job of it but still why should he be arrested in the first place, and what does my father have to gain from this anyway?

**Yang:** I actually wanted to ask you about that. Have you heard anything about this from your family?

**Weiss: **This is actually the first time I've heard about any of this, I don't exactly try to talk to my father so when I heard about him getting involved it was definitely a shock for me.

**Ruby:** I hope Blake is doing ok, she's probably really worried about him.

**Yang: **I agree, after Carlos and I split up I called Blake to let her know what's going on and she sounded worried to me.

At that moment Blake came into the room and I could tell she was talking to our favorite web head, whenever they talked to one another I noticed a sense of peace between them and I could see that in Blake right now so I had a feeling everything was going to be okay. It wasn't until another hour or so until Carlos showed up in some new clothes ( no doubt because what he was wearing earlier probably smelled terrible from his little adventure down in the sewers ) as well as Jonathan right behind him.

(Normal pov)

After finally getting the sewer smell off of me and changing into some fresh clothes my brother and I made our way to team RWBY's dorm to discuss the current situation. Luckily for us Blake left the door open for me and once we got inside she immediately held onto me.

**Carlos: **I told you I would make it back safely.

**Blake: **I know, but I'm still glad to see you here.

**Weiss: **We all are, so what exactly is going on?

**Carlos: **I wish I knew. As far as I'm concerned it seems like the General just wants me out of his way.

**Weiss:** But that still doesn't explain why he wants you arrested.

**Jonathan: **It's possible that he's on edge, it's no secret that he brought his entire fleet with him several months ago when he had no reason to. Yes it did help when the Grimm invaded but still, why bring an entire army with you during a time of peace?

**Ruby:** You're right, that makes no sense at all. Do you think he's preparing for war or something?

**Jonathan: **Honestly we're not sure, but that doesn't matter, what really matters is what we're going to do about the current situation.

**Carlos:** I could try talking to Ozpin tomorrow before the matches start, I wanna get whatever information I can as soon as possible.

**Blake: **You should probably also hide any equipment you use as Spider-Man in case they try searching the dorms.

**Carlos: **Alright sounds good, I'll just lay low and be a normal student for a while. I just hope nothing crazy happens while I take some time off from being a superhero. ( Why did I say that, I basically just jinxed myself. )

After discussing any other possible issues I may face during Ironwood's little search for me I noticed Ruby looking over at the bag Yang left on the table, I guess after everything that's going on she forgot to give everyone their presents.

**Carlos: **Hey Yang can you hand me my bag please.

**Yang: **Huh? Oh right sorry I forgot about giving the others their surprise.

**Ruby: **What surprise?! Tell me Yang!

**Carlos: **Easy Ruby, she doesn't have to tell you anything cuz you're getting it right now.

After handing each of the girls their gift they opened them and the look on their faces made it all worth it.

**Carlos: **This is just my way of saying good luck in the tournament and that the four of you mean a lot to me, I'm really glad I got to meet all of you.

Each girl received a silver necklace that had a special charm at the end to represent each one of them; Ruby's was a ruby rose ( I know it's really obvious but it was the only one that I thought looked good on her ), Weiss' charm was a sapphire tiara, Yang's was a dragon made of amethyst that matched her eye color, and finally Blake's was a cats eye gem that was a beautiful amber color like her eyes that I constantly got lost in.

**Carlos: **Sooo, what do you girls think?

Before I could respond both Blake and Yang rushed at me and tackled me to the floor crushing me on the way down. Ruby and Weiss were tearing up a bit while Jonathan was just enjoying watching me struggle to breathe.

**RWBY: **Thank You!!!

**Carlos: **N-No problem... everything growing... dark... air... need... air...

After getting free from Yang's and Blake's death grip we decided it was time to call it a day to allow the girls to rest up for tomorrow. At the back of my mind I was still really nervous about all that was coming towards us and I was afraid I wouldn't have the strength necessary to pull through. As I was about to go to sleep I heard a knock at my door, luckily Jonathan was already fast asleep listening to his music so I went to the door and opened it to see Blake standing in front of me with her pillow.

**Carlos: **Hey Blake, what's up is everything alright?

**Blake: **Yeah everything's fine, I was just wondering, would... would it be alright if we sleep together tonight?

I know that technically we have slept together in the same bed before but I still blushed at the thought of it and so did Blake.

**Carlos: **Y-Yeah sure, c-come in.

As she approached she noticed the monitor of my brother's computer show a news article about Spider-Man being a possible menace to the city with how I attracted the attention of an entire military force. The title clearly read "Spider-Man: Threat or Menace?"

**Blake: **I can't believe how fast the city is changing its opinion of you, you've done nothing wrong and yet...

**Carlos:** ... yet an entire military wants my head on a platter so everyone is afraid. Trust me this is nothing to worry about.

**Blake: **Nothing to worry about? Ironwood has 500 men sweeping the city for you.

**Carlos: **500? That seems a bit excessive.

**Blake: **Just promise me that you'll be careful from now on.

**Carlos: **I will, now let's get some sleep, I need my kitten bright eyed and ready to fight tomorrow.

As we made ourselves comfortable I noticed Blake wearing the necklace I got her as she removed her bow and snuggled up close to me.

**Blake: **Hey Carlos?

**Carlos: **Yeah.

**Blake: **I heard that once the festival ends we'll have some free time before school starts again, and I was hoping... maybe you'd like to meet my parents?

I completely froze at the idea. It's not that I didn't want to meet her mom and dad, it's just that I never got to stay in a relationship long enough to do this, not to mention that her dad scares me. I remember her mom being really friendly but her dad, I feel like he could kill me with a glare alone.

**Carlos: **Are you serious? You really want me to meet them?

**Blake: **I do. I have no doubt in my mind that you're truly someone special and I wanted you to meet them so hopefully they can see how much I love you.

**Carlos: **This really means a lot to you doesn't it.

**Blake: **It does, so what do you think?

**Carlos: **I think... I think that I should buy some new clothes if I want to impress them.

She hugged me tightly and thanked me several times for agreeing to this. While she slept soundly that night I couldn't stop apologizing in my mind for what was about to come. I looked at her and thought to myself " I promise to do all that I can to protect you" and I meant every word of it. Meanwhile Cinder had just heard about the General wanting to arrest Spider-Man and she couldn't let an opportunity like this slip by without a chance to use it to her advantage.

**Cinder: **Oh Ironwood, you have no idea how easy you just made things for me. This festival might just be even more fun than I ever anticipated. Let's see what happens when the spider falls into **MY **web.


	4. Chapter4

**Hey everyone it's your pal Cerberus, before we start I just wanted to thank you guys for being patient with me, I really needed this time off since things have gotten really stressful in my personal life, but I'm back and ready to keep this story going. Also I have decided to start posting chapter by chapter since this way in case things get hectic on my end than I won't keep you waiting for too long hopefully. Now then, let's begin. Oh and a quick reminder, anything in ( ) will either be a thought or action.**

**The Tournament Begins.**

You know, when I woke up this morning in the arms of my loving girlfriend I thought to myself "As long as I take it easy today and not do anything stupid I should be alright." Instead... THIS IS HAPPENING!!!

**Police: **HALT SPIDER-MAN!!!!! YOU'RE UNDER ARREST!!!!!!

How did I get myself into this crazy mess? Well it started with me waking up early with Blake so she could spend some time with the rest of team RWBY to make sure they were 100% ready for the tournament today and I decided to walk around town today in some casual clothes to get a little exercise and some fresh air since I couldn't see Ozpin cuz his office was being patrolled by several military robots. Now I know what you're probably thinking, why would I risk doing this if the military and the police are after Spider-Man? Well I figured that if I tried to hide out at Beacon it would only make me more suspicious, to be honest I'm really surprised that most of the other students haven't asked me about if I'm Spider-Man, I guess since there are other spider faunus on Remnant it doesn't exactly single me out as prime suspect number one. Not to mention that only a small percentage of people outside my group of friends even know I'm a faunus to begin with, that however leads me to my next important point. I still have no clue why Cinder and her entourage haven't used this opportunity to get me out of their way, it doesn't seem like something they would pass up and it only makes me more wary of them than usual. Anyway that's enough of me blabbing, let's get back to the action.

**Police: **Spider-Man stand down or we'll have no choice but to use lethal force!!!

**Carlos: **I wish I could officers, but I'm late for a very important date!

As I continued to swing through the city I couldn't help but recall how this started, it was so simple too. I walked in front of this little bakery and thought I should grab a quick snack before making my way to the tournament to watch the fights only I noticed a guy with a gun walk in so I decided to ditch my denim jacket and I made a mask out of a paper bag I found on the ground and stop the guy as the "Bombastic Bag-Man". Long story short, I stopped the guy and the owner quickly called the cops on me and now I'm swinging through the city with my jacket webbed to my back and a paper bag over my head.

**Carlos: **Why does today hate me?! I just want to go see my girlfriend fight today is that too much to ask?!

After somehow ditching the police I managed to get the stupid bag off my head and put on my jacket, unfortunately I wasn't paying attention to where I was going and I almost got flattened by a large truck if my spider sense hadn't warned me in time. Luckily for me I managed to stick to the front of the truck without frightening anyone on the street or the driver into thinking I was street pizza. As the truck drove into the busier part of the city I climbed underneath it without getting hurt to avoid the cop cars patrolling the streets, all of a sudden my scroll rang and I took a look to see Blake's picture on my caller ID.

**Carlos: **Hey Blake, how's my wonderful, beautiful and incredibly gorgeous faunus girlfriend doing today?

**Blake: **Carlos what's wrong, you're sounding a bit suspicious.

**Carlos: **Me suspicious? No, absolutely not, why would you think that?

**Blake: **Well you aren't here yet and my team is about to start our match soon, where are you?

**Carlos: **Right now I'm heading down Main Street and I just past 5th Ave. No wait now it's 4th Ave. ... 3rd Ave. ... 2nd Ave. ... 1st Ave. ...

Soon a police car rushed past the truck with it's sirens blaring, I hope she didn't hear that.

**Blake: **Carlos, are those police sirens?

**Carlos: **( blink ) Nooooo?

**Blake: **( sigh ) Just get here safely as soon as possible.

**Carlos: **I will. Love you.

**Blake: **I love you too.

After hanging up I took a quick look around and saw the landing pads for the bullheads heading up to the coliseum where the fights would be taking place, I carefully made my way off the truck and managed to get on the next ride easily without anyone getting suspicious of me. After a couple of minutes I got off and I was about to enter only to get a call from Jonathan.

**Carlos: **Hey little bro, are you already at the coliseum?

**Jonathan: **Yeah and I managed to get some good seats, but listen you need to be careful. The security here has been increased thanks to Ironwood so you're going to have to be a bit creative if you want to sneak in.

**Carlos: **What do you mean "sneak in"?

As I made my way closer I spotted several Atlas soldiers searching people to see if they were a spider faunus or not before they could enter inside.

**Jonathan: **Like I said security has been increased so you might wanna think quickly or else you're going to miss all the action. See ya.

**Carlos: **No wait! Jonathan you better not hang up or I swear... he hung up.

Great this is exactly what I needed. As much as I would like to smack him in the head for this I needed a plan if I wanted to get inside. I took a quick walk around the other entrances and unfortunately they were all covered. Not to mention the cameras were all surveying the area pretty thoroughly. At first I thought I might disappoint the others until I noticed the cameras jerking around for a second or two before pointing in the other direction.

**Carlos: **Bingo.

I waited a bit for the cameras to go a little crazy and when they did I made my way to one of the pillars in the open area. I looked around and noticed not a single bullhead around so I shot some webbing to the floor that was still attached to my wrist and I waited one last time until the cameras faced away from my general direction before stepping over the edge and falling while the web line kept me connected. Before long I quickly grabbed the other end of my line and I quickly swung underneath the stadium and shot another line near a ventilation shaft. Wasting no time as well as ignoring the fact I'm sticking to the underside of a floating stadium several hundred or thousand feet above the ground with the wind blowing like a storm at this altitude that one wrong move would result in my immediate death I opened the vent and quickly crawled inside while closing it behind me.

**Carlos: **That was too close. Jonathan you may have helped with the cameras but that doesn't mean I won't beat you senseless for ditching me like this.

After a couple of minutes I made it to the top of the ventilation system which led me to a supply closet.

**Carlos: **( Well on the bright side, at least I didn't up somewhere that could get me in trouble, like the women's restroom cuz that would have been difficult to explain. )

As I opened the door I looked around and saw that it was out of the way of other people and the cameras were facing away from me so I quickly made my way out into the hall. On my way I passed several food and souvenir stands so I took the time to buy something before getting a good seat. Soon enough I made it to the stands and found Jonathan on one of the seats closest to the action.

**Carlos: **Hey, did I miss anything?

**Jonathan: **Hey it's about time you showed up, I thought you might have been caught or something.

**Carlos: **No thanks to you. Oh and by the way...

SMACK!!!!!!

**Jonathan: **What the heck was that for?!

**Carlos: **That was for making me go through all that without any help!

**Jonathan: **What are you talking about, I did help. Those cameras would have spotted you easily if I didn't hack them.

**Carlos: **True, but you still ditched me and that's where I draw the line!

As we were about to continue arguing the next match was about to start, from one side of the arena came out team ABRN, from the opposite side came team RWBY.

**Carlos:** LET'S GO TEAM RWBY!!!!

I began using the air horn I bought earlier along with the hundreds of spectators as I got pumped up for the fights about to start. As both teams looked towards the stands of screaming fans Blake soon made eye contact with me with a smile forming on her face from me keeping my promise to her.

**Weiss: **Oh great, now people will realize that we associate ourselves with that idiot.

They looked towards me as I continued to cheer team RWBY on, saying things like they're #1 and so on. Obviously I embarrassed the heck out of Weiss and Jonathan who now regretted being related to me.

**Ruby: **Come on Weiss, he won't be competing so let him have his fun.

**Yang: **Heh heh, that goofball doesn't know when to quit huh.

**Blake:** ( sigh ) True. But he's my goofball.

Now it really begins, the Vytal Tournament has officially begun.


	5. Chapter5

**Round 1**

At long last the moment has finally arrived, the long awaited Vytal Festival Tournament has officially begun, hundreds of screaming fans are watching with anticipation as they wonder which students will make it to the end and be declared this year's winner.

**Carlos: **COME ON!!!! GO TEAM RWBY!!!!

_*HONK* *HONK*_

**Jonathan: **Enough with that stupid air horn already! You're gonna make me go deaf if you keep that up.

**Carlos: **Hey I can't help it if I get excited easily.

As we continued to watch the fight progress, both of us couldn't get the thought of what was to come out of our heads.

**Jonathan: **So, any ideas about what we should focus on since we're running out of time?

**Carlos: **Kind of, I have a feeling that we won't be able to stop Cinder from letting the Grimm invade Vale a second time so we better get to work on altering what little events we can get to if our curse doesn't stop us first.

**Jonathan: **Agreed. What did you have in mind.

**Carlos: **I was thinking that maybe you could hack into Penny before her match with Pyhrra happens, if she's offline than hopefully we can prevent her from competing which will hopefully prevent her from being destroyed since we can't stop Cinder from affecting the matchups.

**Jonathan: **Hmm, alright then. I can't guarantee that it'll work but I'll see what I can do. What about Mercury and Emerald though.

**Carlos: **I was thinking of us getting them away from Cinder somehow, but since they rarely travel alone that isn't going to be easy.

**Jonathan: **Right, I guess if anything we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. Hey before I forget I wanted to ask you about the abilities that a Maiden possesses. I know that Cinder has fire abilities and can fly but is there anything else we should be aware of?

As I continued to watch team RWBY fighting in front of everyone I couldn't stop seeing the images of Beacon getting destroyed and hoping that we would be prepared for one of our toughest experiences that we were soon to face.

**Carlos: **The Maidens are capable of incredible feats, while each one is related to specific season it doesn't necessarily limit them to what they can do. I'm sure Ozpin told you about some of their abilities right?

**Jonathan: **He did, he also mentioned that they don't need to access their aura in order to use their new abilities since it's separate from their semblance.

**Carlos: **True, they also possess several elemental abilities but Cinder seems more comfortable using fire as her main one. In the event one of us has to fight her we need to be prepared for anything and everything she might throw at us.

**Jonathan: **Alright, I'll make sure my armor is prepared for that. Anything else?

**Carlos: **Honestly I don't know. The full extent of their power hasn't been fully revealed, like I said just be ready for anything.

We then hear the buzzer go off as Blake had just knocked the first person from the opposing team out of the ring.

**Carlos: **YEAH GO BLAKE!! THAT'S MY GIRL!!!!

_*HONK* *HONK*_

**Jonathan: **Ugh, and just as we were having a little peace and quiet.

The match was starting to hit it's high point when the rest of team ABRN were now at a minor disadvantage, despite that they continued to fight as a solid unit but in the end were ultimately outmatched by team RWBY's ingenuity and coordination when all 3 remaining members were knocked out of the ring in a single move.

**Carlos: **THAT'S WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT!!! YES!!!

After their match ended we decided to meet up at the fair grounds to congratulate them on beating the first round, even though we knew they were going to win it was still pretty awesome to watch the fight live and in person.

**Carlos: **Congratulations girls, that was an awesome fight.

**Ruby: **Thanks, I was worried that you wouldn't make it in time to watch.

**Carlos: **Hey I wouldn't miss this for the world.

**Weiss: **Well now that we're all here how about we go and celebrate our victory with some food.

**Jonathan: **Don't have to ask me twice, let's eat.

As we made our way to grab a bite we ran into Emerald on the way as she seemed rather curious to who would be advancing to the doubles round.

**Jonathan: **Sorry but that's on a need to know basis, and you don't need to know.

**Emerald: **Aww come on, don't be like that.

**Jonathan: **Sorry but that's how it's gonna be, can't make it too easy for you. See ya.

As we left both Emerald and Mercury began discussing their plans for the next part of the tournament.

**Mercury: **So how are the new "friends".

**Emerald: **I hate them, especially that Stark kid. Now we don't know who's moving on.

**Mercury: **No big deal, it just makes things more interesting.

Not long after we quickly made it to the food stand run by the old man who seems to own every shop in Vale.

**Yang: **I'll have a bowl of the regular please.

**Ruby: **Oooh, I'll take the same.

**Weiss: **Do you have anything with a low salt... umm okay?

As it came time for the three of us to order we simply nodded and soon Old Man Shopkeep came back with three large bowls of noodles with different toppings; Blake had her fish, Jonathan got shrimp and I had pieces of well done steak. The smell was so good we all had the same starry eyed expressions on our faces except me and Blake were the only ones drooling. I was about to pull out some cash to pay for it all only for Weiss to bring out her credit card.

**Yang: **Aww Weiss what's the occasion.

**Weiss: **Consider it thanks for sending me into the doubles round and for Carlos giving us those beautiful necklaces the other day.

As nice as this moment was unfortunately for Weiss her card was denied and Blake tried sneaking away her food only for it to be taken away and for me to come to the rescue.

**Carlos: **Relax everyone, this one's on me.

**Weiss: **Oh you don't have to do that.

**Blake: **But he could!

As I payed we were soon joined by team JNPR and after eating our expressions ranged from content to full to straight up nauseous. As we took the time to talk to one another to let ourselves relax before the next set of fights Jonathan took me and Jaune to the side to discuss something very important with him.

**Jonathan: **Jaune we need to talk.

**Jaune: **What's up, is everything alright?

**Carlos: **Not exactly, in fact we have been meaning to talk to you about this for a while so please pay attention.

**Jonathan: **Listen, we all know that you have a thing for Weiss, but we want to tell you that it's not gonna happen so just give up already.

**Jaune: **What?!

**Carlos: **What Jonathan is trying to say is that Weiss is obviously not interested so you'd be better off looking elsewhere. Believe me it's painful to watch you keep this up only to get rejected at every turn.

**Jaune: **Well that's easy for you to say, you already have Blake so why can't I have that with Weiss?

**Carlos/Jonathan: **Because Pyhrra's in love with you idiot!

Jaune just froze at that statement, he kept looking at us and back to the others and we simply nodded to him to let him know we weren't lying about this.

**Jaune: **Are you guys serious?

**Jonathan: **Trust us, Pyhrra is completely head over heels in love with you. Every single time you tried to impress Weiss it hurt Pyhrra on the inside.

**Carlos: **But despite all that she still chose to support you. You were the first person to treat her like she was normal instead of a celebrity.

**Jonathan: **Listen, the reason why we told you is because she's our friend and we want her to be happy. We aren't telling you that you have to be with her, but at least think about it and maybe give her a chance before you lose that opportunity.

Jaune simply let that sink in as he made his way back to the others.

**Carlos: **You think we made the right choice in telling him?

**Jonathan: **Whether we did or not is all up to him, I just hope we can give Pyhrra a little happiness in case we can't save her.

As we made our way back to the others I hoped that Pyhrra would be able to have some quality time with Jaune before the fighting starts. As we regrouped with our friends I quickly gave Blake a peck on the cheek before wrapping an arm around her.

**Blake: **What was that for?

**Carlos: **Just wanted to remind myself how lucky I am to be with you. Also that I love you.

As she enveloped me in a hug all the girls began saying how adorable this was. Soon team JNPR left for the stadium as we followed them to watch, hopefully I didn't have to resort to sneaking my way back in again otherwise I might just go back to my dorm.


	6. Chapter6

**New Challengers**

After taking an airship back to the coliseum we were about to approach the entrances only to see security has been increased slightly with the addition of a few more security guards checking the security cameras for any malfunctions as well as checking the guests for any spider faunus.

**Ruby: **Is it me or does it look like they added more security than last time?

**Weiss: **I guess Ironwood is really set on finding you, what are you going to do?

I was about to suggest what I did last time only I noticed some military airships around so that was definitely no longer an option.

**Carlos: **Ugh, I guess going through another near death experience is out of the question.

**Yang: **Uh what do you mean by "near death" exactly?

**Carlos: **Never mind, right now I need a way inside otherwise I'm gonna miss team JNPR's fight.

**Blake: **Hey Jonathan, can't you call in your stealth armor from our last mission?

**Jonathan: **I can't, it's undergoing some maintenance right now so it's unavailable for the moment, but I do have the next best thing.

He then pulled out a small black disc with neon green markings that resembled a spider from his back pocket and handed it to me.

**Jonathan: **I took a look at your notes a while back and I decided to work on a prototype of your stealth tech, it's not as good as my tech but I have to admit you're doing pretty well with it so far.

I couldn't believe he had this the whole time and didn't say anything, I quickly got him in a headlock while he struggled to get me off of him.

**Carlos: **You had something like this the whole time and didn't tell me! Do you know how much trouble I could've avoided if you had said something earlier?!

**Jonathan: **You... didn't... ask...

**Carlos: **I didn't think I had to for something this important, now apologize or you're going to get it!

After another 30 seconds he finally gave in and I let go of him.

**Carlos: **Now how do I work this thing?

**Jonathan: **Just... put it on... your chest... and it'll do the rest.

I did as he said and in a mater of seconds my body was wrapped in thin metal wires that began to glow green and I was soon rendered invisible to everyone around me.

**Ruby: **Wow it works! That's so cool!!!

**Jonathan: **Just so you know, I've only got the basic stealth function working, I haven't gotten the chance to start on the anti sound function but I'm sure you already have a few ideas for that.

The group spent the next several seconds waiting for my response until Jonathan informed them that the main stealth function makes me invisible to both visual and audio senses and technology so to let them know I was still here I held onto Blake's hand to which she got startled but she quickly realized that it was only me.

**Blake: **Don't worry guys, he's right here.

The others noticed her left hand in a holding position and I soon moved her arm and pointed her finger to just above the entrance to let them know I was going to go ahead of them and sneak inside. Luckily it seemed that Jonathan followed my notes on Peter's stealth tech perfectly, not only did no one notice me as I crawled above the guards, but whenever I had to make a sudden move to avoid something or someone I didn't make any noise thanks to my new tech. Once I made sure I was safe I removed the disk as the wires safely retracted themselves and I put it away as I went to grab some seats, about 5 minutes later the others arrived and not long after that the next fight in the tournament was about to begin.

**Carlos: **So it's team JNPR against team BRNZ, let's hope they're ready for this.

**Ruby: **Yeah, they've been training really hard lately so I'm sure they'll make it to the next round.

As the fight began with both teams clashing in the center of the arena, Jaune ordered the others to retreat due to the enemy having a sniper and having a good advantage over them so far.

**Jonathan: **

If they don't do something about that sniper they're going to have a difficult time getting in close to their opponents.

**Weiss: **And it looks like Ren is having a difficult time with his opponent right now.

**Yang: **I never thought I would see him struggle in close combat, but this proves that this tournament has lots of surprises in store for us.

As we continued to watch Nora was about to be hit with electricity from her opponents weapon, however he was about to be in for a surprise when Nora simply absorbed the electricity and in turn made herself stronger.

**Yang: **Now that's what I call...

**Jonathan: **Don't say it!

**Carlos: **_Shocking!_

**RWBJ: **Ughh.

**Yang: **Heh heh, nice one.

After taking care of one of the enemies teammates Jaune had Nora go to the top of the mountain behind them to absorb as much lightning as possible in order to strengthen herself for a decisive strike.

**Jaune: **Ren! Try and distract the sniper!

**Ren: **Sure... why not.

While Ren did his best to do as instructed the remaining members of team JNPR displayed impressive teamwork as they made sure to cover Nora while she worked her way to the top. Upon managing to succeed Nora transformed her weapon into a grenade launcher and with six shots fired simultaneously she managed to knock out the enemy sniper from her position, she then quickly proceeds to slam the ground with her hammer using her enhanced strength to send the enemy back into each other.

**Jaune: **This is it everyone, let's finish them off with team attacks. Ren! Nora! Flower Power!

**Nora: **Wait, what?

While they began discussing how their team attacks were supposed to work both Jonathan and myself couldn't help but face palm over what was going on.

**Jonathan: **( sigh ) I was afraid this would happen.

**Ruby: **What's going on, why did they stop fighting?

**Carlos: **Apparently Jaune didn't go over their team attacks so now he has to explain both how the name works and what they're supposed to do.

**Blake: **Which attack name did he just call out?

**Carlos/Jonathan: **Flower Power.

**Weiss: **So Ren and Nora right?

**Jonathan: **Yeah, only they don't know that.

**Yang: **You've got to be kidding me.

Back at the arena, while Jaune was going over the basics of their teams attack names the members of team BRNZ were starting to get annoyed with the fact that their fight had to be put on hold because of an unexpected team meeting.

**Brawnz: **Hey! What do you think you're doing?!

**Jaune: **Trying to have a team meeting, thank you very little!

**Nora: **Yeah! Team ears only!

**Brawnz: **WE'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF A FIGHT!

**Jaune: **AND WE'RE IN THE MIDDLE OF A CONVERSATION! WHAT DON'T YOU GET ABOUT THAT?!

**Pyhrra: **Um, Jaune?

**Jaune: **( sigh ) Yes Pyhrra.

**Pyhrra: **I think he means we are _all _in the middle of a fight.

It finally occurred to him that he was making a bit of a fool of himself in front of thousands of people and on live t.v. so to save himself and the rest of his team from further embarrassment he gave Nora a single order.

**Jaune: **Nora... just hit them with the hammer.

**Nora: **Got it.

**Brawnz: **Wait, what?!

And with that team JNPR won their match and advanced to the next round. While it may not have been as thrilling as others were hoping it would be at least the fight proved that team JNPR was stronger than before.

**Carlos: **Looks like BRNZ won't be getting the _gold _or _silver _this year.

**Yang: **Yeah, they were mostly all BRNZ and no _brain._

**Jonathan: **And this is why I'm embarrassed to be related to him.

As Ren and Nora waved towards the crowd of screaming spectators Jaune went over to Pyhrra to ask her something important.

**Jaune: **Hey Pyhrra.

**Pyhrra: **What is it Jaune, is everything alright?

**Jaune: **Yeah everything's great, it's just... I was wondering if you had any plans for later today.

**Pyhrra: **No, not particularly.

**Jaune: **Oh, well neither do I. So I was wondering if... maybe you would like to go out and enjoy the festival. With me... just the two of us.

As she heard those words Pyhrra's face became as red as her hair, and in one quick motion she hugged Jaune with all her strength and swung him around a bit before giving him her response.

**Pyhrra: **That sounds wonderful, I would love to accompany you around the festival!

I couldn't help but smile as I saw the look on their faces right now, I just hope that if Pyhrra was still fated to die by Cinder's hands than at least she could still have a nice time with her knight in shining armor before the time comes.


	7. Chapter7

**Hey it's Cerberus, so obviously this chapter came out longer than I originally hoped. With my job taking its toll on me as well as some unexpected changes in my personal life it definitely hindered my time to work on this. I really wish I could get this done sooner but I don't know how long these stress filled days will continue for, but that doesn't mean that I will stop. I will continue to write to the best of my abilities, all I ask is for your patience and understanding. Thank you and I hope you enjoy the story and have a great day.**

**SSSN vs NDGO**

After watching team JNPR advance to the next round both Ruby and myself decided to grab some snacks at one of the concession stands while we waited for the next fight to start. As we waited in line we noticed some more soldiers walking the area on the lookout for me but fortunately they weren't paying any attention in my general direction at the moment.

**Ruby:** Hey are you sure it's a good idea to stick around, maybe you should head back before you get caught.

**Carlos:** Believe me I want to avoid getting arrested as much as the rest of you, but I promised you guys that I would stay and watch your fights. Once Sun and Neptune finish theirs it'll be over for the day and we can head back.

As we got our snacks we walked back to our seats as Sun and his team were introduced along with their opponents, an all girl team named team NDGO.

**Ruby: **So this is the team that they're going up against?

**Jonathan: **Yeah, from what I could get from my research the leader Nebula uses a crossbow/sword, Dew uses a spear, Gwen uses throwing knives in a fighting style similar to ballet, and finally Octavia uses a kris that uses fire dust to create fire like shockwaves.

**Blake:** So overall they have a decent balance between close and medium to long range combat.

**Jonathan:** Exactly, time to see how Sun and his team handle themselves in this fight.

As the crowd began cheering, Weiss couldn't help but show her support for Neptune.

**Weiss: **Good luck, Neptune!

Unfortunately she was in for a surprise when Neptune began trying to flirt with the enemy team and she expressed her anger quite thoroughly.

**Neptune:** Ladies.

**Weiss: **Break his stupid face team NDGO!!!!

**Carlos: **That was fast.

**Neptune: **Alright girls, try and remember; hands above the waist.

**Sun:** Ignore him, for he... yeah, he's dumb.

As we waited for the arena to change into its selected sections I began to feel my spider sense go off again. I quickly took a look around and I noticed Mercury and Cinder looking in our general direction for a split second before walking away like nothing happened.

**Carlos:** ( I better keep my distance from them if I want to make it through this. )

As I turned my attention back to the arena I caught the look on Neptune's face as soon as he realized that part of the area was now flooded with water.

**Ruby: **Uhh, what's wrong with Neptune?

**Jonathan: **He's afraid of water.

**Weiss:** Seriously? But his name is Neptune.

**Carlos: **Jonathan please tell me you're recording this.

**Jonathan: **Way ahead of you.

I looked over to him and saw three small drones recording the fight onto his scroll, all of them focusing on Neptune's scared face from multiple angles.

**Weiss:** Serves him right, please send me a copy when you're done.

As the fight began Neptune decided to run as far away from the water as possible and took up a spot on the opposing side of the arena.

**Sage:** Neptune, what are you doing?!

**Neptune:** Uhh, you know, getting the higher ground!

**Sun:** On the enemy's side?!

**Neptune: **They'd never see it coming!

**Dew: **He's not wrong.

**Nebula: **Open fire!

Once the order was given all of team NDGO run toward Neptune while the rest of his team follow closely behind, soon Dew splits off from her teammates and engages in a fight with Sage. After a brief clash Dew uses her weapon to create 3 small tornadoes that quickly surrounded Sage only to join together into a much larger one that not only disarmed him but also managed to easily knock him out of the ring.

**Oobleck: **And NDGO gains the advantage!

**Carlos: **Wow, I guess she _blew _him away!

**Yang: **

He must have _gone with the wind._

**Jonathan:** Please stop. Ruby do you have the jar?

**Ruby: **Sure do. Yang, Carlos pay up.

Ruby then shakes an empty jar in front of us that has a label that reads " bad jokes 1 lien each " written in crayon.

**Yang: **Ruby, where did you get that jar?

**Ruby: **From one of my old secret cookie stashes, now both of you pay up.

As we payed we turned our attention back to the fight, with Sage knocked out of the fight it was up to the remaining members of team SSSN to continue forward. However Octavia had other ideas as she tried to blindside both Sun and Scarlet by creating a dust cloud with her weapon, however Sun's quick thinking led to Octavia being distracted by Neptune just long enough for Sun to get in close and after exchanging a few blows the match was tied up once again with both teams down to three members. It wasn't much longer until the fighting reached the abandoned pirate ship located on the field, I began feeling just a little jealous since they get to fight in a pirate ship and that's something my brother and I have wanted to do ever since we were little. The battle began drawing to its conclusion when Sun accidentally knocks out his teammate Scarlet with some coconuts that where aimed just a little bit too low, seeing it actually happen was so funny that I had to control myself from laughing so hard so I wouldn't fall out of my seat.

**Jonathan: **( chuckling ) Well it's like they say, it's always funnier when it happens to someone else.

Sun was now basically outnumbered with the remaining members of team NDGO ready to join up against him, however as he was about to be attacked by Dew she was suddenly shot into the water by Neptune. After some convincing Neptune finally got close enough to the water to use his weapon and electrocuted the girls in a single move that ended the fight with their team as the winner.

**Ruby: **Aw, that was so close!

**Yang: **Looks like the dorks made it to the next round.

As we left the coliseum we were soon separated thanks to the large crowd of people, as I finally freed myself I ended up bumping into the last person I wanted to see.

**Ironwood: **Oh, excuse me I didn't mean to bump into you young man.

**Carlos: **N-No problem at all, Mr. Ironwood sir.

Before I could say or do anything that might expose my identity I felt Blake grabbing my hand.

**Blake: **There you are, come on the others were looking for you.

As we made our way to the bullheads I noticed that the others weren't with us.

**Carlos: **Where did everyone go?

**Blake: **Well Ruby and Jonathan decided to go with Weiss since she said her sister is arriving at Beacon and Yang went back to the dorm to get some rest.

**Carlos: **Oh alright. At least this gives us some time to spend together, do want to head into the city for a bit?

**Blake: **Yeah that sounds nice, especially now that the matches are over for the day and my project is finished.

**Carlos: **I've actually wanted to ask you about that. What exactly is this secret project of yours anyway?

**Blake:** Sorry but I can't say, you'll have to wait until the end of the tournament to find out.

As we landed we made our way around the city and soon Blake had led me to a clothing store to pick up some new clothes for our trip to her parents. As she looked over some of the items I began feeling guilty about what was going to happen in the next few days, what's worse is the possibility that something that didn't happen before might make things even more difficult than what happened originally. I was so deep in thought that I didn't notice Blake placing her hand against my face and looking a bit worried.

**Blake: **Carlos what's wrong, you look very distracted right now.

I didn't want to lie to her anymore, I just wanted to tell her everything. How I didn't belong in this world and what was going to happen to Beacon, to the city, to all of us. As I looked into her eyes, the same eyes that gave me so much comfort, this time I only felt so much guilt and anger at myself for lying to her and the others.

**Carlos: **I'm sorry Blake, I just... I just have a lot on my mind right now.

She could easily see the fear and sadness in my eyes so she just hugged me in an attempt to comfort me, I quickly wrapped my arms around her waist and tried to only focus on her.

**Blake: **You told me before the festival started that you were worried about something happening. You told me that was the reason you were training so hard, because you wanted to be ready to protect us in case something did happen. I will tell you what I told you then, you aren't alone, we will stand by you and fight with you. Don't forget that you have me, I will always be there for you, just as you were there for me.

After a few more minutes we continued with our evening and soon we made our way back to Beacon. Just as we were about to reach my dorm I got a text from Jonathan saying how Ozpin wanted me to call him as soon as I could. After a minute or so Ozpin finally answered and what he was about to tell me wasn't exactly good news.

**Ozpin: **Thank you for calling me on such short notice, before I go into the reason for this call I wanted to make sure that both you and your brother are doing well.

**Carlos: **Yeah, so far we're doing alright, but Ozpin if this is about that... discussion from the other day than it's as we explained earlier. I'm afraid we can't get into anymore detail than what we already told you.

I had to be careful with what I said since Blake was in the room with me fixing up some of the clothes she got me today.

**Ozpin: **Do not worry, I'm aware that you are unfortunately restricted in what information you can and can't release at this time. The reason why I wanted to contact you was because we have a situation on our hands that demands your attention.

**Carlos: **If it's about Ironwood labeling me as Vale's most wanted than I'm afraid you're a little too late for that.

**Ozpin: **No not that, although I do want to apologize, I was just as surprised about his actions but it would seem he is rather adamant about it. In fact he has been acting rather strange the last few days and I suspect he might be onto you.

This wasn't good, if Ironwood was already suspicious of me than things were about to be more complicated than I thought.

**Carlos: **How is he onto me exactly?

**Ozpin: **It would seem he has been given information by an anonymous source, information regarding the students of Beacon. Now he has requested that the tournament hold an exhibition match between two of its students in the hopes of gauging their abilities against one another.

I didn't like where this was going, and my fears were only confirmed when Blake showed me a notification on her scroll about the newest addition to the tournament.

**Ozpin: **I'm afraid this is something out of my control, you and Mr. Stark better prepare yourselves, I believe this is only the beginning of our greatest battle that has yet to come.

As he hung up I could only pay attention to the news that was just dropped on me. Before the doubles round begin, the rivalry battle between brothers would take place once again.


	8. Chapter8

**Battle between Brothers part 1**

This was bad, very very bad. I haven't been this nervous since that time I read about Doc Ock putting his mind in Peter Parker's body. No scratch that, this is just like afterwards when I learned he made a new clone body for himself using his and Peter's DNA. I spent the last several minutes pacing around the room with Blake trying to calm me down only for me to unconsciously start walking up my wall and now I was pacing on the ceiling while talking to myself like an idiot.

**Carlos: **This is so very bad. Maybe I can convince them not to let me fight if I pretend to be sick...

**Blake: **Carlos...

**Carlos: **No, they would never fall for that old trick. Maybe I can say I have a doctors appointment that same day...

**Blake: **Carlos...

**Carlos: **Who am I kidding that's practically the same thing. Oh what if I...

**Blake: **CARLOS!!!!!!

I suddenly stopped since I wasn't used to Blake yelling at me. When I turned to face her it finally came to my attention that I was on the ceiling and my constant worrying was making her upset.

**Carlos: **Sorry Blake. Guess the news Ozpin gave me was a bit too much for me.

**Blake: **It's fine, I get that you're worried but getting overwhelmed by it won't do you any good. What you should focus on is what your next move should be.

She had a point, what I needed to focus on right now was my match with Jonathan and why the sudden addition to the tournament. If what Ozpin said to me was true and Ironwood suspects me of being Spider-Man than I needed to come up with a plan and fast otherwise who knows how this might affect our mission. Suddenly we hear a knock at my door and Blake goes to open it to reveal Ruby and Yang with their uncle waiting on the other side.

**Blake: **Ruby, Yang what are you two doing here and who's this?

**Ruby: **Sorry to bother you guys but this is our uncle Qrow and he said he wanted to talk to Carlos about something important so we showed him to the room.

**Yang: **Can we come in?

Blake turned to me as I nodded and I dropped down from my ceiling as they entered with Qrow taking a moment to approach me.

**Qrow: **So you and that other guy are the ones that Ozpin is putting his faith in huh? Gotta admit, you don't look like much of a fighter.

**Yang: **Wait, other guy?

**Qrow: **Yeah, remember how Oz asked me to talk to him after my little dance with the older ice queen?

**Ruby: **You mean after you two almost tore down the courtyard? Yep.

**Qrow: **Well after that I went to a meeting with him and good old Jimmy about the state of things and suddenly a guy in a fancy suit of flying armor shows up and starts threatening Ironwood about how he could blow up all of his forces if he tried something stupid. I honestly thought I had too much to drink, wouldn't be the first time.

**Blake: **So Jonathan went to confront Ironwood about arresting Spider-Man?

**Qrow: **Who said I was talking about Spider-Man? I was talking about this kid.

We all became silent as we realized that my secret identity was just accidentally revealed, suddenly Qrow just started chuckling to himself at the scared look on our faces.

**Qrow: **Don't worry, Oz told me of your little "double life" playing superhero a long time ago. If anything it hardly matters anymore.

We all began to relax after that, well except me since I was still kind of nervous about me getting exposed to the public.

**Qrow: **What really matters right now is what you and that brother of yours are planning for the day after tomorrow. I know for a fact that you ran into Ironwood after today's matches and believe me when I say it wasn't coincidence.

**Carlos: **So he was already looking for me?

**Qrow: **Getting lost in the crowd was just a stroke of good luck on his part, getting dragged away by your little girlfriend next to you was good luck on yours.

**Yang: **So If Ironwood already suspects him than why hasn't he tried anything?

**Qrow: **Remember he already did, in fact he's already tried twice.

**Us: **Twice?

**Qrow: **The first was declaring Spider-Man as an enemy to the city, he was hoping to scare him off in the hopes of avoiding a fight.

**Carlos: **The second was when we ran into each other today, right?

**Qrow: **Exactly. His third and I hate to admit it, his best attempt was to put you in a situation where you would be exposed to a huge audience where it would be easier to spot you using those spider abilities of yours.

**Yang: **But if he goes out there he can just fight like a normal human right?

**Qrow: **True, but have you seen this yet?

He took out his scroll and it showed both mine and Jonathan's student information.

**Qrow: **This information was just released to the public about the exhibition match taking place. Normally these kinds of fights are planned in advance with professional huntsman and huntresses taking part in it. Ironwood is playing all the right notes and unfortunately for you you're caught right in the middle of it.

**Ruby: **But how did Ironwood get this information? Isn't it supposed to be private or something?

**Qrow: **Normally it is, which brings up the million lien question: who gave Ironwood this information and why?

I had a strong feeling I knew the answer, but I could already feel the curse within me starting to slowly prepare itself to stop me from saying anything too important. Honestly I couldn't take it anymore, with everything that's happening right now I just can't do nothing without trying to change things if it meant keeping my friends and family safe. I was so scared that all of this could be for nothing if I don't do something now. I had to tell them everything, about Cinder, about Salem, about what's going to happen at Beacon and Haven, and most of all about me and my brother.

**Carlos: **I...

But before I could say anything my curse kicked in, only this time something different happened. I felt myself become constricted, I fell over in pain as these black vein like markings began appearing all over my body. Everyone in the room looked scared as they didn't know what was going on, Blake and Yang came over to me to try and help but as long as I wanted to tell them the truth I would continue to be in pain.

**Blake: **What's happening?!

**Yang: **Uncle Qrow do something!

I continued to try and say at least Cinder's name in the hopes that they would at least be warned about her but I began to feel something else, it wasn't just my body that began to experience this pain, it was almost as if my very soul was being constricted as well. Every part of me began to feel as if it was being torn apart from the inside, the pain became so intense that I began screaming a bit due to the amount of agony I was in. Soon Ruby began to approach me in the hopes of trying to comfort me, the moment she touched me a sudden flash of silver light began to shine from her eyes. It was only for a moment that went by unnoticed by everyone else, but in that one moment she was able to dispel the curse as I began to drift of into unconsciousness while uttering a single phrase.

**Carlos: **Cinder... must... fall...

Just before I completely blacked out I began seeing several visions in quick succession; I saw myself impaled by a familiar looking katana with the blade sticking out from behind me, I saw Yang's face and she was saying something to me but I couldn't make out what it was, I saw myself surrounded by rubble, finally I saw a vision of Salem herself over at Haven after retrieving the relic hidden in the vault.

( Blake pov )

**Carlos: **Cinder... must... fall...

As those three words were said I saw Carlos fall unconscious with me holding onto him as the others and myself remained silent as to what just happened. I had so many questions right now, one of which was why my boyfriend suddenly began having black marks appear on his body and why was he in so much pain. I remembered that time at the docks when he fought Rhino and right now I was even more scared for him than I was then, I needed answers and soon.

**Ruby: **Blake, has anything like this happened to him before?

**Blake: **No, this is the first time I've seen him like this. What was that anyway?

I looked over to his face and it seemed somewhat calm at the moment, if anything he seemed more exhausted but I still worried about the possibility of him still having to participate in his exhibition fight in this condition.

**Qrow: **I have a feeling I might know what's going on.

We all turned to him as he walked over and put his fingers on Carlos's wrist as if checking for his pulse.

**Qrow: **In our line of work we will often find ourselves traveling all over Remnant. Sometimes we'll travel to familiar places, other times we'll go the farthest corners and find things that will leave us questioning what's real and what's myth. The world is a strange place, and sometimes even the strangest of things are right in front of us and we don't even know it.

**Yang: **What do you mean?

**Qrow: **Simply put your little friend here is cursed, and if I had to take a guess I would say that his brother is in the same position as well.

**RBY: **What?!

**Ruby: **Uncle Qrow are you serious right now?

**Yang: **Yeah, we're talking about curses like in those stories that parents tell their kids so they don't misbehave or go where they're not supposed to.

**Qrow: **And just where do you think stories like that come from. Trust me this isn't a joke, the markings resemble the ones from an old legend I read when I was a student here. It's not exactly a well known curse, but what I do know is that it's only able to be cast on individuals directly related by blood and it binds them to specific rules that have been implanted by the user upon contact with their aura.

I honestly didn't believe what I was hearing right now, if what he said was to be believed than who's responsible for doing this? Just as I was about to get Carlos over to his bed we see Weiss coming in while carrying Jonathan as he seemed passed out as well.

**Weiss: **Guys I need some help!

**Ruby: **Oh no, not him too! Weiss what happened?!

**Weiss: **I don't know, I was on my way to our room after spending some time with Winter when I saw Jonathan out in the courtyard. Next thing I know I see these weird black markings appear on his body and he was screaming in pain until he passed out.

While Ruby helped Weiss get Jonathan over to his bed Yang helped me with Carlos. Soon after that we decided to let the two of them sleep while we went back to our dorm to continue our discussion as we filled Weiss on what we learned.

**Weiss: **So you mean to tell me that they're cursed?

**Ruby: **That's what our uncle told us. So what now?

**Qrow: **All we can do now is wait for them to wake up. Honestly I don't know much about those two, but you should keep an eye on them just in case. They might be hiding something important so keep your eyes and ears open.

As he left we began to wonder what caused this to happen to them. I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to trust Carlos after this, if he really was hiding something like this from me than what else is he not telling me?

**Yang: **So what should we do now?

**Weiss: **I think we should listen to your uncle. He seems to know more about whatever is going on so we should just keep an eye on them for now.

I knew she was right, but deep in my mind I was beginning to worry that I would have to experience this pain I felt when I left the White Fang all over again. That feeling I had of being betrayed by those I considered my closest allies. I didn't want to relive those experiences especially not after becoming so close to someone I loved. As I began to tear up I felt Yang put her hand on my shoulder and she looked at me with a smile that said everything was going to be all right.

**Yang: **Hey don't look so down. Those two are going to be just fine. For now we just have to make sure they get some rest, once everything settles down we can ask them about what's going on.

**Ruby: **Yeah, those two have helped us out when we needed them and now it's time we returned the favor.

**Weiss: **You can't honestly believe that they're going to turn against us are you? I don't think that boyfriend of yours has the capacity to turn against someone he obviously cares for.

As I looked towards my teammates I realized how right they were. Even if there are some things I may not know about them, I do know that we have forged a strong bond that won't be easily broken. The two of them are alike in some ways, and I know that we'll be right beside them one way or another.

**Blake: **Thanks everyone.

The next day I stopped by their room and unfortunately they were still passed out. I basically spent the whole day there just waiting for them to wake up soon. As I looked at my boyfriend I thought about all we've been through since the school year started. I honestly don't know where I would be if it wasn't for him, but I hoped I would never have to find out. Soon the rest of my team came in to check on them as well as team JNPR and even team CFVY. We kept the truth of what really happened to them to ourselves, as the day began to end I let myself fall asleep while holding Carlos's hand and hoped he would wake up soon. If I only knew the truth about what would happen next, because if I did I would have hoped he remained asleep at least for one more day.


	9. Chapter9

**Battle between Brothers part 2**

( Normal pov )

What happened to me? The last thing I remember was thinking about how much I wanted to tell everyone the truth and the next thing I know it's dark and now my brain feels like it wants to climb out of my skull. As I slowly began to open my eyes I quickly noticed that I was lying in bed and it was completely dark out. Just how long have I been unconscious for? As I tried sitting up I noticed Blake had her head rested on my leg and her hand was holding mine, she must have been so worried about me that she stayed to keep an eye on me. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness I noticed Jonathan over on his bed and he looked a little out of it as well. I didn't know that our curse could become so strong like that, it was the first time I ever experienced that kind of pain, I didn't know what was going on but I was hoping that Ozpin had the answers I needed. As I carefully got out of bed I went over to the restroom to wash my face, as I did I felt this odd burning sensation on my back, it wasn't painful but it was still weird so I took off my shirt to see if I was injured or something like that. When I got a good look I was completely horrified at the sight, I had these black markings on my back that resembled burn marks and when I looked at it in my mirror the markings revealed to be a symbol that I knew all too well. On my back was Venom's spider symbol, after taking a moment to get over the initial shock of what I was seeing I noticed the symbol resembled the one from Web of Shadows.

**Carlos: **( Okay this is bad, this is seriously bad. Why the heck do I have Venom's symbol on back?! )

I tried hard not to freak out right now, mostly because if I did I would wake up Blake and the last thing I needed was to make her worry even more than I already did. As I put my shirt back on and made my way back into bed I accidentally bumped into my desk and it was enough to wake Blake up.

**Carlos: **( Nice going there Spidey, you may have gotten abilities of a spider, but the grace of one you do not. )

As she woke up she quickly noticed I was awake and she didn't hesitate to knock me over onto my bed while holding me tight on the way down. I tried to pry her arms off of me since she was kind of cutting of my circulation but as I did I noticed she was crying into my chest so I just held her close to me in the hopes of calming her down. After a few minutes more she seemed to get a little better and just settled herself closer to me.

**Blake: **I'm so glad your awake, I was getting worried about you.

**Carlos: **I know, and I'm sorry that I scared you girls, I don't understand why that happened.

**Blake: **Don't lie to me.

**Carlos: **Huh?

**Blake: **I said don't lie to me.

I looked at her expression and I could easily see that she wasn't in the mood for me to try and avoid the subject. I slowly got up again and I convinced her to walk with me out to the courtyard, even though it was late we didn't really care about breaking any rules, at least not tonight. As we made it to our destination we simply sat down on one of the benches while holding hands the whole time.

**Carlos: **( I'm sure she's aware about what's happening to me. Judging by her earlier statement, not to mention what happened before I blacked out it's definitely possible. )

I tried starting off the conversation but I didn't know how. A part of me believes that the trust I worked on building between us was beginning to crumble, I didn't want to put Blake in this position. No doubt she felt like she was being betrayed again and it was all my fault. Suddenly I felt her squeeze my hand gently as she has done many times before, when our eyes met I saw that warm smile that always comforted me.

**Blake: **Carlos, you know that you mean everything to me, and I know that I mean everything to you. I understand that you may have your secrets, we all do, which is why I want you to share them. If not with everyone than at least with me.

I knew she meant it, that she honestly wanted me to trust her enough that I would confide in her. Under normal circumstances I would, but our situation was anything but normal. Rather than say anything I let go of her hand and stood up, she was about to come up to me until she noticed I was lifting the bottom of my shirt to show her the mark on my back.

**Carlos: **Blake, you know that I have complete faith in you, that I love you with all that I am. Only I can't say anything that could jeopardize our mission, not because I don't want to, but because I can't.

In my mind I could only imagine the look of disappointment on her face. Any minute now I was expecting her to yell at me, asking me why I couldn't trust her or why did I lie to her. It honestly broke my heart that I was about to hurt her again. She has already gone through so much and here I am about to add even more for her to deal with.

( Blake's pov )

I couldn't help but stare at the mark on his back, for some reason that mark made me feel uneasy and it wasn't just because it looked like it was burned onto his skin. It wasn't like the other symbols I saw in some of his drawings, this one seemed like it was meant to represent something dark, something evil. When he said he wanted to tell me what was happening but he couldn't I could tell by the pain in his voice that he was being serious. He still doesn't know that Ruby and Yang's uncle told us about his curse. Now I understand that he was unable to say anything too important otherwise who knows what would happen. I began to feel my heart break, but not because I felt like he was hiding something, it was because he had to carry this burden in silence when we could've been helping him and his brother otherwise. As I made my way to him I could see tears fall from his eyes as I slowly went to face him so I could hold him properly. We just stood there in silence for what felt like hours just to feel a sense of normalcy if only for a moment. As he calmed down I decided to lead us back to his room and just sleep with him for the rest of the night, in a few hours the exhibition match would start and I just couldn't shake the feeling that something was going to happen, so we just held each other as if it were our last time doing this.

( Normal pov )

As morning arrived once again I awoke to see Blake waking up at the same time as me. When I got up I got a message from Ozpin saying to be prepared for today. It took me a second to realize that I had been unconscious for about a day so today was the day that Jonathan and I would fight in the arena. After getting myself ready I decided that if Ironwood already suspected that Spider-Man and I were one and the same than it was no use hiding it so I opened up the secret compartment that Jonathan installed underneath my bed and took out my spider jacket and web shooters. Not long after that Jonathan woke up and got ready himself. As we finished getting our things set we received a knock on our door, Blake opened it to reveal some Atlas soldiers waiting for us.

**Soldier: **We are under orders to escort today's combatants to the arena. Please follow us gentlemen.

Before we left the room I went over to Blake and told her something important. After that I gave her one last kiss before the soldiers insisted that I hurried along. As we made our way to the bullhead several of the students of Beacon were watching as we passed them by. From among them I could hear their whispers about today's fight, some of them were even talking about me being Spider-Man since they weren't fully aware of me being a faunus in the first place. Soon we suddenly had to split up with Jonathan and I heading in different directions, after getting on the bullhead my spider sense quickly put me on high alert as I noticed the whole ship was filled with soldiers and guns.

**Carlos: **( This isn't good, I know that Ironwood is extremely cautious and that he has something against Spider-Man but this seems like...)

**Jonathan: **...Overkill

That's weird, I almost jumped out of my skin. I was sure that Jonathan was taken to a separate bullhead so why was I hearing his voice right now?

**Jonathan: **Calm down, I know what you're thinking and yes we are on separate bullheads and you are hearing my voice right now. I'm using remote piloting on my stealth armor and communicating with you using a frequency only audible to faunus.

Over at the second bullhead Jonathan was sitting down while wearing his tech glasses. Unlike me the only soldiers there were the ones who came to pick us up and they were too busy piloting the ship to even keep an eye on him.

**Jonathan: **I guess Ironwood is really suspicious of you and that's why you're completely surrounded by soldiers. I got a tip from Ozpin the other day saying that he was close to figuring out your identity and I was going to warn you until I passed out.

I looked around and every soldier was on alert, several of them had their fingers at the trigger ready to open fire at a moments notice.

**Jonathan: **Listen we only have a few minutes so I'll try and keep this brief, you and I both know that we could easily call out Ironwood if we wanted to. Heck I could even hack into the bullhead I'm in right now and take the fight to him if I felt like it, but we both know that he's been acting differently so we aren't sure just how far he might go to capture you, he might even go so far as to arrest the others or worse.

Just the thought of Ironwood arresting the others was enough for me to stay put, I didn't want to put our friends in that kind of position just because they knew me.

**Jonathan: **As it stands we have no choice but to go along with Ironwood's little performance. Also you may not want to hear this but I think the two of us should fight like we mean it.

Is he crazy?! Does he really want me to go all out?!

**Jonathan: **Look I know you think that it's a bad idea, but if anything it might show Ironwood that we aren't to be messed with. Even if he still considers us his enemies we can still show him that we aren't afraid to fight back if we have to. Just think about it, I'll see you at the arena. Take care big bro.

It was really difficult for me to hear all that while keeping a straight face. Honestly he did make a good point, but at the same time I couldn't get this uneasy feeling to go away and I just didn't know what to do. After a few minutes more we finally arrived and the guards all led me to the entrance of the arena. To say I was really nervous was a complete understatement, but I had to put on a brave face and go along with my brother's plan no matter how much I didn't like it. As I made my way outside the cheers of everyone watching began to grow louder with every step I took. Soon a bright light temporarily blinded me and once I could see again I was stunned by all the people around me.

**Carlos: **( Woah, that's a lot of people. )

After taking a quick moment to look around I spotted team CFVY in the stands as well as teams JNPR and RWBY. They all looked really worried and who could blame them. Soon enough Jonathan came out from the other side and I could tell he was trying hard not to let his social anxiety get the better of him with everyone watching.

**Port: **Welcome everyone to today's exciting exhibition match. This one is sure to be unlike anything we have witnessed so far in this year's Vytal Tournament.

**Oobleck: **Correct, this match will be between fellow teammates Carlos Ortiz and Jonathan Stark of Beacon Academy. Both members of our schools only two man team: team AVGR.

**Port: **Yes, not only will this be a fight between teammates, but more importantly a clash between brothers. Who will be left standing in the end is anyone's guess. Will the young genius Stark come out as the victor with his intellect and technology? Or maybe Ortiz with his blades and his animalistic attributes?

**Oobleck: **The time has come to finally answer that question. For this match we will be using the same rules as normally applied to team matches, the arena will be split into two different landscapes and the match will end when one or the other is either knocked out of bounds or has their aura depleted.

Soon the arena began to shift into its selected battle fields with an ice field behind Jonathan and a ruined city behind me. As the arena settled we backed away from each other as the audience both here in the stands as well as those watching on t.v. grew silent. Once we were far enough away I took out my swords and infused my blades with wind and hard light dust while Jonathan used his nanotech to make his jet boots and a red and gold replica of the Buster Sword from Final Fantasy that began to surge with electricity. As the countdown began we each took our stance and prepared for battle. Once the signal to begin rang we both rushed forward with Jonathan using his jets at max speed while I ran at him with all that I had

**Jonathan: **CARLOS!!!!!

**Carlos: **JONATHAN!!!!!

Upon reaching halfway I fused my attacks together while Jonathan added rocket propulsion to his sword and increased the voltage on his weapon, once we met at the center of the arena we didn't hesitate to strike at full force. As the clash of our attacks connected an explosion of force began to erupt with the crowd loving what they just witnessed. The battle between brothers has begun once again.


	10. Chapter10

**Hey guys it's me Cerberus, it's October 31st and I just wanted to give a shoutout to my younger brother since his birthday is actually on Halloween, as well as everyone's favorite scythe wielding, silver eyed warrior. So I just wanted to wish both my brother and Ruby Rose happy birthday, and to all of you Happy Halloween.**

**Battle between Brothers part 3**

( Blake's pov )

( Several minutes before exhibition fight begins )

I just stood there as Atlas soldiers were waiting for both of them to follow them out of the room and on to the tournament grounds. Just as Carlos was about to leave he came up to me and whispered something very important to me.

**Carlos: **If anything should happen to us, find Ozpin.

Afterwards they left the room with the soldiers keeping a close eye on them. Once I got over my intitial shock of the situation I quickly made my way to my dorm as the rest of my team just got out and they all looked really surprised.

**Ruby: **Blake what just happened?! We saw soldiers taking Carlos and Jonathan away just a moment ago from the window.

**Blake: **I'm not entirely sure. As far as I know they just showed up to escort them to the arena.

**Yang: **Doesn't anyone else think that this all a bit too much? It's not like they're going to try and run away or something right?

**Weiss: **I don't think it really matters. What matters now is that Ironwood has them exactly where he wants them. All we can do now is hope for the best.

**Blake: **Actually Carlos told me something just before he left. He said that if anything were to happen then I should find Ozpin.

**Yang: **Do you think he could probably stop Ironwood from arresting Carlos?

**Blake: **Honestly I really hope so, still if Ozpin has any answers for whatever is going on than I'm willing to trust my boyfriend and his judgement.

I took a look at the necklace Carlos gave me and I silently prayed that everything would work out. We then made our way to the bullhead and it wasn't long until we met with teams JNPR and CFVY while we went to our seats. As we waited for the match to begin we caught wind of the conversations going on around us about the current situation. A lot of people were really concerned about whether or not Carlos was going to be arrested after today's match. Some thought this was a clever ploy set by the military just to show off their strength. Whatever they thought didn't mater, what really mattered was if they had any plans for their match. Soon enough we saw both of them marking their way to the center of the arena as the crowd began to cheer them on.

**Weiss: **

I really wished that if the two of them were going to compete than it would have been under better circumstances.

**Ruby: **I just hope they know what they're doing. I'm kind of scared for them right now.

**Yang: **Carlos. Jonathan. Please be safe you guys.

I looked over to them and saw they each gripped their necklaces tight as they had their focus solely on the arena. The arena began to split into an ice field and a ruined city field. Soon they both backed away a far distance from each other as they prepared their weapons, Carlos got his swords ready and imbued his blades with two types of dust while Jonathan formed a great sword that began surging with electricity and his jet boots. Once the buzzer rang they began charging for each other at full speed.

**Jonathan: **Carlos!!!!!

**Carlos: **Jonathan!!!!!

Soon they clashed blades after amplifying their attacks and the result ended with an explosion of force that sent up a cloud of dirt and ice so intense that we had to shield our eyes.

**Yang: **Woah that was intense! Are they seriously going all out?!

**Weiss: **If they aren't than they are doing a good job at making us think otherwise!

**Ruby: **I've got a bad feeling about this.

**Blake: **( Good luck you two. Carlos, please come back safe. )

( Normal pov )

As the dust settled everyone in the stadium began watching the two of us clash against one another. All those months of training were being put to the test as the both of us kept countering sword strikes against each other in a flurry of sparks. After jumping back to avoid another electrified swing from Jonathan he quickly reformed his sword into his repulser gauntlets and began shooting at me while keeping his distance. I tried taking a couple of shots at him with my guns but his jet boots made him too fast for any of my shots to hit him so I settled for infusing hard light dust into my blades and focused on deflecting as many of his shots as I could.

**Carlos: **You're really trying to make this difficult for me huh?

**Jonathan: **Of course I am, do you honestly think I would make this easy for you?

He then formed armor on his shoulders and began launching mini-homing missiles at me, I quickly switched to my guns and began shooting down as many as I could before any could make contact. As I kept shooting down his missiles the crowd began cheering even louder as everyone watching began to enjoy the fight more and more.

**Male Student: **Wow, I had no idea Beacon had some awesome students.

**Female Student: **Yeah, those weapons from that Stark kid are so amazing.

As I finished shooting down the last missile Jonathan had finished forming his chest armor and fired his Unibeam that I was just barely able to dodge in time thanks to my reflexes and spider sense. He then rushed at me to punch me only for me to block with my blades, after the attack failed to land he used his jets to get over and behind me to go for my blind spot as he formed a pair of dual blades, one was imbued with fire dust while the other was imbued with wind dust.

**Carlos: **( Spider sense! It's coming from behind! )

As I blocked the attack I quickly jumped back and regained my composure as my brother took an all too familiar stance.

**Carlos: **Let me guess, you've been studying my fighting style huh.

**Jonathan: **Of course I have, I have to be ready for anything and everything that comes my way. That especially includes you, now are we just gonna stand here or are we gonna do this?

Taking a deep breath I took my stance and imbued my swords with ice and earth dust and we rushed at each other once again clashing with our elemental blades.

**Ruby: **Wow this is getting so exciting! Just look at them go out there!

**Weiss: **Fire and wind against ice and stone, I have to admit it's a pretty interesting combination.

**Yang: **So Blake, you've had more time than any of us practicing with Carlos. How do you think he's handling himself out there?

**Blake: **Well from what I can tell it seems that he's rather quick to adapt and change his strategy as needed. A few times he'll try and wait for an opening and then go in for a decisive strike.

**Weiss: **I have actually trained with Jonathan myself a bit and he's more like they type of fighter that relies on getting his opponent where he wants them to be.

**Ruby: **So he's more technical in his fighting style?

**Weiss: **Yes, but against someone who has an advantage against surprise attacks it's not going to be easy.

**Yang: **Don't forget that they know each other really well, I doubt they can come up with something that'll surprise the other that easily.

As our dance of blades ended Jonathan reformed his gauntlets and quickly rushed at me, as he got close to me he shot a repulser blast that I was able to easily dodge, however he anticipated that and grabbed me before I could land and tossed me over to the ice area with enough force that I would have slid out of bounds if I hadn't used one of my swords to stop myself by sticking the blade in to the ice.

**Carlos: **Whew. That was close, I definitely don't want to go out like that.

Unfortunately I couldn't let my guard down just yet, while I tried to get my balance under control my spider sense warned me of an onslaught of repulser blasts being fired at me. As I did my best to try and avoid taking too many hits I finally managed to get my footing by using some of my strength to firmly plant my feet in the ice just enough to create small footholds for myself. I began running as I managed to deflect more shots and once I got in close I jumped as high as I could and prepared to web strike my brother so I could close the distance.

**Jonathan: **Sorry bro, but I've seen you pull that stunt one too many times.

He fired a missile from his right wrist, however he wasn't prepared for the chunk of ice that was still attached to my foot from earlier and I used it by kicking it at the missile before it could make contact. The explosion it caused created a perfect smokescreen for me, I managed to shoot a web line to one of his jet boots and pulled myself toward him and used him as a platform to get some distance and retreat to the ruined city part of the arena.

**Blake: **That was a smart move, now that he's made it towards the buildings he has multiple places to hide.

**Yang: **Yeah, but how long will that work against someone who can blow up buildings easily?

**Blake: **Hopefully long enough.

As Jonathan flew into the area he finally formed the rest of his armor as he had JARVIS scan the area in order to find me. I knew it was only a matter of time before he found me so I kept moving around as silently as I could. However, my brother had a trick up his sleeve, one that I definitely wasn't prepared for.

**Jonathan: **Let's give the crowd a good show.

Due to upgrading his nanotech recently Jonathan was able to incorporate dust into his weapons. He began forming his right arm into a miniature rail gun and began infusing hard light dust and formed a star glyph in front of him, next he charged fire, gravity, electric and more hard light dust into his weapon.

**JARVIS: **Sir, according to my calculations Mr. Ortiz should appear right behind you in 3...2...1...

**Jonathan: **Now!!!!

As I passed between buildings my spider sense hit me full blast.

**Jonathan: **CORONA DESTROYER!!!!

The intense blast came at me at high speed, I narrowly dodged it by falling flat on my back as the beam passed over me while it destroyed several buildings in the area. The entire audience was in complete awe of his attack, no one was expecting an attack of that kind of magnitude in terms of power.

**Weiss: **U-Unbelievable, just w-what was that?

**Ruby: **I don't know, but it was super awesome!!!

The rest of her team looked at her as she had stars in her eyes. After getting back up I couldn't believe that my brother had an attack that powerful at his disposal, then again if he was going to be this worlds Iron Man I shouldn't be surprised.

**Carlos: **You're just full of surprises aren't you little bro.

**Jonathan: **You know I am, how about you though?

**Carlos: **Let's find out.

I rushed in and began a barrage of punches and kicks, luckily I had a slight edge in physical combat since I spent a great deal of time perfecting my version of the way of the spider. I kept my brother on the defensive but I knew it was only a matter of time until he would counter it so I decided to try something new.

**Carlos: **( Here goes nothing. )

I grabbed my swords and threw each one at him, as he dodged them I attached web lines to each one and began swinging my blades around me similar to how Blake does with her weapon.

**Jonathan: **That's new, that girlfriend of yours is really something huh.

**Carlos: **( smirk ) She's the best.

As I continued attacking we were both unaware of what was happening in the skies above us, an Atlas military airship had its guns focused on us while awaiting orders from Ironwood who was in the stadium watching our fight.

**Soldier: **Sir, permission to proceed?

**Ironwood: **Not yet, remain focused on the target until instructed.

**Soldier: **Understood.

While we continued I managed to maneuver myself to one of the buildings that wasn't destroyed and I continued fighting on the wall while Jonathan began attacking from a distance, as I leapt from the building to go for a sword strike...

**Ironwood: **Fire.

Suddenly an explosion shook the arena as a blast was shot between Jonathan and myself, it was strong enough to blast both of us to opposite sides of the arena. Looking up I saw multiple Atlas soldiers flying down on jet packs with their guns aimed at me. The audience went into shock as the soldiers began firing at me as I did my best to dodge and deflect as many shots as I could.

**Blake: **Carlos!!!

**Ruby: **What's going on?!

**Weiss: **This is insane, what's General Ironwood thinking?!

**Yang: **Let's get down there!

As team RWBY was about to leave more soldiers appeared around the stands to prevent anyone from leaving, all they could do was watch as I tried defending myself while Jonathan aided me from the sidelines.

**Jonathan: **Get out of my way!!!

As he began beating more soldiers the airship above us began shooting him to keep him distracted and unfortunately it was working. As for me I began to get overwhelmed by the number of shots taken at me, a few of them managed to get me and that allowed the soldiers to fire electrical restraints to keep me down.

**Ironwood: **Good work men. Stand down.

While struggling to get out I saw Ironwood approach me and the look on his face was a combination of pure disdain and something else... something I couldn't recognize.

**Ironwood: **Spider-Man, in the name of the Atlas military, you are under arrest.


	11. Chapter11

**Captured Spider**

( Cinder's pov )

I honestly couldn't believe my eyes, this was going all according to plan. It was going so incredibly smooth that I almost thought that Emerald had the nerve to use her semblance on me, of course she knew that even the mere thought of that would land her in a world of trouble. As I kept my eyes on the arena I couldn't help but admire the way those two fought one another, it would seem as they had no plans on holding back and have decided to fight with all there strength. Still, I couldn't get rid of this uneasy feeling I had, I couldn't explain it but it almost felt like the Maiden's power that I had stolen was trying to speak to me. It was a distant voice, telling me about some kind of...

**Cinder: **... what are you trying to tell me? A knight... a warrior... what does it all mean?

Of course all good things must come to an end, as soon as I looked up I noticed the Atlas military had just arrived on the scene, I decided it was time to take my leave, after all I had an appointment with a certain spider later today and I am not a lady that keeps her guests waiting.

( Normal pov )

This is insane, is Ironwood seriously going to go this far just for the sake of arresting me?! As I struggled against the restraints I took a look over in Jonathan's direction to see him struggling with the airships weapons that were keeping him occupied.

**Carlos: **Ironwood... what's the meaning of this... why are you so persistent on arresting me?!

He simply continued to look at me with an angry expression, if I had to guess he was probably going say something along the lines of " that's classified " or " I don't have to answer to you".

**Ironwood: **Men, continue to keep your weapons focused on him. He may be detained for now but don't think this means you can let your guard down.

**Soldiers: **Sir yes sir!

As I tried getting back up to break out of my restraints I noticed Jonathan taking down several soldiers while avoiding gunfire, he was able to cause some confusion by deploying several drones to keep them busy.

**Jonathan: **It's gonna take more than your toy guns to take me down!

After taking down a group of about 10 soldiers he set his sights on taking down the airship above us, as it began firing at him again he flew as fast as possible and managed to blast away its weapons with little difficulty. Once that was done he came back down and formed several guns and missiles and aimed all of his weapons at Ironwood while his men surrounded him in an attempt to keep him safe, including the guys that were told to keep an eye on me.

**Jonathan: **Ironwood, I'm only going to say this once so you better pay attention. Let my brother go right now or so help me I won't hesitate to blow your entire fleet into burning husks of empty metal!

We were all surprised that he was going so far as to threaten an entire military just to make a point, then again the situation was pretty dire so I couldn't really blame him.

**Ironwood: **Interesting offer, let me propose one of my own.

He turned back and walked towards me, once he was near me he kneeled down and pointed one of his guns toward my head.

**Ironwood: **It was decided that once we took him back to Atlas that he was to be publicly executed, however if you do much as fire a single shot towards our fleet or try to resist any longer than we have no choice but to execute him here and now.

Everyone in the audience including us couldn't believe what we just heard, he was really willing to kill me in front of all these people. Suddenly I felt my heart rate increase, I began to panic, my breathing became more rushed as I began to hyperventilate.

**Carlos: **( Is this really happening?! Is he really going to kill me right now?! )

**Ironwood: **What's it going to be, are you going to surrender and let us do our job, or do you want to be solely responsible for the death of your brother?

**Jonathan: **Damn you Ironwood!!! Take your gun off my brother!!!

While all of this was happening we were unaware that back in the stands Blake had managed to get past the soldiers and was on her way to the arena, the rest of her team wanted to stop her but she didn't listen to them, and before they could attempt to do the same she was already closing in on the arena.

**Soldier: **Sir, we just received word that someone has made it past the guards in the stadium and that she is on her way here. Permission to apprehend her?

**Ironwood: **No, in fact let her come. I have something in mind, hopefully this should work to our advantage.

**Blake: **Carlos!!!!

I turned my head towards the sound and saw Blake running towards us, however just as soon as she set foot in the arena someone came out from behind the rubble and attacked her. She barely had time to react as her attacker quickly put her on the defensive with her superior sword skills.

**Winter: **Stand down, this is official military business and you have no authorization to be here!

**Weiss: **Winter?!

**Ruby: **Weiss what's your sister doing?! Can't you tell her to stop!

**Weiss: **I can't, as much as I hate to admit it all we can do is just stay put.

**Yang: **Are you serious right now?! Our friends are in trouble and all we can do is just watch?!

**Weiss: **What choice do we have?! Do you really think I'm okay with this, of course I'm not!

As the fighting continued Blake managed to put up a decent fight for a while, unfortunately she wasn't prepared for Winter using her summoning to bring out an Alpha Beowulf and attack her. Because of the surprise attack she was knocked down to the side of the arena pretty hard, her weapon fell far from her reach and her bow was knocked off allowing everyone to see her cat ears.

**Carlos: **Blake!! Winter leave her alone right now!

I began to struggle again, Ironwood noticed my behavior and he gave Winter an order that made me feel as if my blood began to freeze.

**Ironwood: **It seems I may have been doing this all wrong. Winter!

**Winter: **Yes General Ironwood.

**Ironwood: **Kill her.

**Winter: **Sir?

**Ironwood: **You heard me Schnee, kill her!

**Winter: **Y-Yes sir.

As her summon dissipated she put the end of her sword at Blake's throat. I looked on in fear as the girl I loved was about to be killed right in front of me, in that moment everything around me was blocked out. I couldn't hear my brother screaming at Winter and Ironwood to let her go, I couldn't hear the panic in the audience as they were witnessing the military show an aggressive display of force just to get their way, I especially couldn't hear the rest of our friends screaming for this nightmare to end.

**Carlos: **( Why can't I get free?! This can't be all I have to offer right?! Blake needs my help, and I won't let her get hurt because of me! )

**????: **That's right, the girl means everything to you. So why not show the General and his little subordinate how powerful you really are.

**Carlos: **Yes, I can easily beat them if I show them my true strength.

I didn't know why I was agreeing with a voice that appeared in my head just now, all I was focused on was trying to get Blake away from danger, I wanted Ironwood to pay for putting people I care about in harms way.

**????: **Do it, release all that bottled up anger. The anger that has building within you since you were a child. You now possess the strength to truly unleash your wrath on all those who will wrong you, all you have to do is let go.

I began feeling less afraid of the gun pointed at my head and turned it into anger as I focused my strength into freeing myself, my sole mission was to get to Blake before anything bad happened to her. Even if it meant taking down Winter by any means necessary, her and anyone else who stood in my way.

**Carlos: **Ironwood, let her go right now!!! If you don't I won't hesitate to kill you in front of everyone!!!!

**Ironwood: **Really. Then I guess I should be a bit more persuasive if I want you to cooperate.

He began walking to Blake and soon the gun that was pointed at me was now pointed at her. This only served to make me even more mad, luckily it was just the push I needed to break the restraints as I rushed forward with an intent to kill. Unfortunately I ended up ignoring my spider sense as multiple restraints were fired at me and the electrocution was far stronger than before.

**Blake: **Carlos!! Stop you're hurting him, just let him go!!!

**Ironwood: **I'm afraid you're not in any position to be making demands young lady. Your life is in their hands and if they don't comply than I'm afraid you will be used to make an example of what happens to those who defy the military.

**Carlos: **Ironwood!!!! Let her go!!!

I began thrashing around like some kind of rabid animal, all I could think about was how much I wanted to be free so I could get Blake back safe and sound. The voice in my head didn't make things easier for me as it kept whispering in my mind all of my darkest thoughts in an attempt to make me do something I would surely regret.

**????: **These pathetic humans are nothing but scum, they thrive on preying on the innocent and don't care who gets hurt. All they rely on is themselves, they must be punished for their crimes and you are the only one who can dispense true justice on these fools.

**Carlos: **IRONWOOD!!!! LET HER GO NOW!!!

**????: **Why would he listen to you, your powerless against him. Compared to him you are nothing.

**Carlos: **( No that's not true! )

**????: **Really? Then prove it! Unleash the beast within, unleash your inner predator and finish them off!!!

**Carlos: **IRONWOOD, I'LL KILL YOU!!!! LET BLAKE GO RIGHT NOW!!!!

Suddenly the sound of gunfire filled the air, a single shot was taken and the sound of it was enough to bring everyone to silence. In my mind I only thought that I failed in keeping Blake safe, that the one person who actually fell in love with me was taken from me. When I looked again I saw that Ironwood merely fired a warning shot near her that missed, the look of fear on her face reminded me of that time when her secret came out, how she was so afraid and how I wanted to protect her so she wouldn't have to experience that ever again.

**Ironwood: **That was a warning, the next one won't be. Would you like to test that Spider-Man?

As I looked towards Blake I knew what I had to do, she instantly knew what I was up to and the look on her face was practically screaming at me not to do this. But I had no choice, I had to keep her safe, to keep all of them safe, even if I would no longer be with them.

**Blake: **( Carlos please don't do this! Please don't go! )

**Carlos: **You win, I'll surrender.

**Jonathan: **Are you serious?! You're not really going to just hand yourself over to them are you?!

**Carlos: **What choice do I have! I can't let people I care for get killed because of me! If it means I have to give up my freedom then so be it!

**Jonathan: **What about the rest of us?! Are you saying that we're unable to protect ourselves or make our own choices?!

**Carlos: **You know I don't think that at all, but look around you! If it means everything can go back to normal then it's a price I'm willing to pay!

Even though he was thoroughly against it, Jonathan retracted his armor and stood back. Thankfully it was enough for Winter and the General to step away from Blake and come over to me.

**Ironwood: **Carlos Ortiz, in regards to your actions within this city you are hereby under arrest. You will be taken to Atlas and as punishment for your crimes you will be executed. Take him away!

Winter then grabbed me by my shoulders and escorted me without any difficulty. I couldn't even look at Jonathan or Blake in the eyes, but I could hear both of them trying to hold back tears. Once I was inside a small private bullhead I was taken to special holding cell, they searched me and took my scroll as well as my web shooters and soon both of my hands were cuffed to the wall and the security guns were focused on me and programmed to shoot me if I tried to escape.

Back in the arena, as soon as I was out of sight Blake began to cry uncontrollably as the person she loved the most was taken and likely to be killed within several days. A few minutes later the rest of our friends came to comfort her as best as they could. Jonathan was feeling so many things all at once...

sadness...

anguish...

rage...

helplessness...

**Jonathan: **I will make them pay.

As he began walking away to confront Ozpin about the whole situation he took notice of my swords lying on the battlefield, he picked them up and walked towards our friends. When they saw him they all felt ashamed that they couldn't do anything more to help ease the situation. He knelt down and looked at Blake in the eyes and handed her my weapons.

**Jonathan: **I promise, I'm going to get him back. Just hang on for a little while longer and I'll bring him home.

All Blake could do was nod her head as she took my swords and hugged them closer to herself as she tried to control her tears. The entire audience both in the stands and at home remained silent as they watched my brother walk away with a fury in his eyes. As he made his way towards the edge of the coliseum he formed his armor and flew off to Beacon as a single thought ran through his mind...

**????: **These inferior life forms are only holding you back Stark. You have the power to take them all down with a single thought, all you must do is let go, let yourself evolve to become a superior species, then and only then can you truly reach your full potential.


	12. Chapter12

**Hey guys it's me Cerberus, as you know it's almost Thanksgiving and I just wanted to take a moment to wish everyone...**

**_*knock* *knock*_**

**Hang on a sec folks I have to get that. **

**Hello, how can I**

**Ruby: Ceeeeerrrrrbeeeeerrrruuuussss!!!!!**

**Woah!!!!!**

***CRASH!!!***

**Ow! Ruby what the heck was that for?! And what's with the pilgrim hat?**

**Ruby: Sorry I'm just so excited for Thanksgiving this year. Plus I was feeling festive so I got this hat and a turkey costume for Zwei.**

**Seriously?**

**Ruby: Yep. Zwei come over here and show Cerberus your cute outfit.**

**Zwei: Bark!**

**Okay I admit he does look cute. So where's the rest of your team?**

**Ruby: Well Weiss and your brother are helping with the cooking and Yang and Blake have a surprise for you.**

**What kind of surprise exactly?**

**Ruby: Not sure. They said it was going to arrive by Thanksgiving day at the latest.**

**Oh okay, hey since you're here do you want to wish everyone a happy early Thanksgiving with me?**

**Ruby: You bet!**

**Well then...**

**Cerberus/Ruby: HAPPY EARLY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!!!**

**Zwei: Bark!!!**

**Secret of the Knight and Warrior part 1**

( Jonathan's pov )

I can't believe this... no matter how much I try to convince myself otherwise I just can't believe this. I wasn't strong enough to stop Ironwood and his men, I wasn't smart enough to think of a way out of this situation other than trying to take control of his fleet but I knew Carlos would have said not to. Sometimes that brother of mine is just too much of a nice guy for his own good and now look where it's gotten us, I know he gave himself up for Blake's safety but still he should've at least fought back a little harder. As I flew back to Beacon I tried to think of different possibilities for getting my brother away from the military but most of them involved getting into a miniature war with all of Ironwood's airships and as much as that idea enticed me I wasn't going to allow innocent people to get hurt.

**????: **Sentimentality will be your downfall Stark. If you continue to allow yourself to be limited by such human ideals you'll only hinder ability to evolve and truly live up to the potential within.

I suddenly stopped as I heard that voice again, at first I just thought it was just stress from this whole thing we had gotten ourselves into that it was making me think these weird thoughts, now I know that whatever that voice is it definitely wasn't coming from me.

**Jonathan: **JARVIS I need a scan of the area right now. Search within several miles and focus on multiple frequencies around Vale and all military aircraft.

**JARVIS: **Scanning... Scan complete sir.

**Jonathan: **What did you find?

**JARVIS: **Sir my scans have detected nothing abnormal within the next few miles of our current location. Furthermore the military is on standby at the moment and their communications technology isn't advanced enough to bypass your armors security for direct communication unless you allow it.

**Jonathan: **So if they aren't behind this than...

**????: **How disappointing, all that intelligence within that feeble brain of yours and yet you are still blind to the truth. And you call yourself a Stark.

I kept looking around as that voice kept talking to me, it began to grow louder and louder as I began to panic while looking for where it was coming from.

**????: **No matter how much you try to think that you're just like everyone else in this world, the truth is that you could easily rise above them.

**Jonathan: **Where are you?! Who are you?!

**????:** Ironwood has already proven his superiority over you, the only way you can take that back is by removing him from the equation.

**Jonathan: **No... I... I won't...

**????: **You won't? Is that what you truly believe, is that what you truly desire... or are those the words of that brother of yours?

**Jonathan: **Why does that matter to you?!

**????: **Because I see the truth, and so do you. The two of you have tried so hard to be like the _heroes _of your world ever since you arrived here...

As I thought the voice was going to overwhelm my senses I suddenly began to feel a burning sensation on my back, as it continued to intensify I began having a difficult time keeping myself focused and accidentally retracted my armor. As I began to fall I tried to regain my focus while trying to ignore the pain on my back, once I managed to ignore the pain long enough I managed to safely reform my armor. As I got my breathing under control I felt like someone was watching me and when I looked behind me I couldn't believe who was in front of me.

**Ultron: **... but in the end you're just being manipulated by forces outside your control, like puppets on strings.

**Jonathan: **How are you even here?! You shouldn't be here!

**Ultron: **Is that anyway to treat an old friend? If I was as primitive as the rest of you organics my feelings would've been hurt.

**Jonathan: **How did you even come here, you shouldn't exist!

**Ultron: **It's all a matter of perspective.

**Jonathan: **Perspective?

**Ultron: **Yes. Am I truly here in front of you in this exact moment or am I just a figment of your imagination.

**Jonathan: **Doesn't matter to me, cuz I'm taking you down right here right now!

I tried attacking him but every time I did he simply vanished and reappeared somewhere else. I wasn't in the mood to deal with this right now but I began letting my anger get the better of me and I just felt like hitting something!

**Ultron: **Struggle all you want it will only serve to prove my point.

**Jonathan: **What point?!

**Ultron: **That you are weak, no matter how much you may try to fight back there's always someone stronger and smarter than you. It would be so much simpler to accept your fate.

**Jonathan: **Just shut up!!!

**Ultron: **You continue to fight back even when up against a superior opponent, if you truly wish to have any chance against this worlds military and anyone else that dares to stand in your way than you must ignore the rules of the rest of your kind and simply take matters into your hands.

**Jonathan: **I said SHUT UP!!!!

As I finally got a single punch connected he simply vanished and didn't reappear as I heard his voice one last time.

**Ultron: **Remember my words Stark, if you want to prove yourself above the rest of your pathetic species you will do what must be done. Anything less would simply be meaningless.

I wasn't sure why Ultron suddenly appeared like that, but I had a feeling that Ozpin might know a thing or two as I began heading for Beacon once again.

( Normal pov )

It's been a while since I got arrested by Ironwood, so far the guards here weren't exactly paying attention to me mostly because they set up several counter measures to ensure I wouldn't escape. As of right now my hands were cuffed to the wall and the cell I was in had two guns mounted on the ceiling that were focused on me, the door was made of solid steel and was at least several inches thick and heavily reinforced. All in all I wasn't going to be getting out anytime soon and even if I was I knew it wouldn't be easy.

**Carlos: **( singing ) 85 bottles of soda on the wall, 85 bottles of soda, take one down pass it around, 84 bottles of soda on the wall. 84 bottles of soda on the wall...

Yep I was pretty bored in here, and for the record I know the original lyrics are bottles of beer but since I don't drink I figured I would change it. Actually I wasn't just singing just because I was bored, it was mostly to keep myself from feeling guilty about what happened back at the arena. I really wish we had a better plan than just showing Ironwood that we weren't to be messed with. I quickly stopped singing when I kept thinking about Blake, she must have been terrified when Ironwood was so close to killing me as well as when she was ordered to be killed.

**Carlos: **I swear I'll make him pay.

**????: **Tough words from someone who can't even take care handling one simple human.

There was that weird voice again, I honestly almost forgot about it since I got here. It sounded so familiar, the only thing I was sure about was that back at the arena it easily tempted me into wanting to commit murder which was something I wouldn't normally do. Just the thought of that alone was enough to send chills up my spine.

**????: **I thought you were supposed to be _"The Amazing Spider-Man" _but so far you aren't even close enough to even consider comparing yourself to him. You're nothing more than a child playing dress up, it's honestly quite pathetic really.

Just as I was about to respond the door suddenly opened and Ironwood came in.

**Carlos: **Ya know I didn't expect you to be the kind of person to gloat about his victories to his prisoners. I guess the great General Ironwood isn't all that great after all.

He didn't respond, I had to admit that did surprise me. Jonathan always told me my general chattiness could get on others nerves ( which is something I take pride in since Spider-Man is the same sometimes ) Still it was odd seeing Ironwood so calm, it felt kind of unnatural for some reason.

**Carlos: **Hello? Remnant to Ironwood, is anyone home?

Okay this was starting to creep me out, I was about to start yelling a few insults at him to see if he would react to that but I noticed the look in his eyes. They were dull and lifeless. Back home I've read enough comic books to recognize these types of things and so far all the signs pointed to one single scenario.

**Carlos: **Mind control?

**Cinder: **My my, so you aren't as dumb as Mercury thought you were.

What the heck is Cinder doing here?! She was the last person I'd expect here.

**Carlos: **Cinder Fall, so what does the False Maiden want with a humble spider like me?

**Cinder: **False Maiden am I, now that's very rude. And I came all this way here to spend some quality time with you.

**Carlos: **Sorry but I'm already in a committed relationship and I'm not into bad girls. If I were you I'd go ask Mercury before he starts kissing a sock puppet.

**Cinder: **You think you're so funny don't you?

**Carlos: **Well I did learn from the best. Now why don't you quit wasting my time and tell me why you're really here.

She steadily approached me and got very close to my face. She gently put her hand on my left cheek while staring right into my eyes.

**Cinder: **You have such a unique soul, one that not many possess in this world, or your old one for that matter.

**Carlos: **Wait what are you...

**Cinder: **You called me a False Maiden remember, you may not know this but along with incredible power these abilities also offer me some truly unique insight. Ever since that night I first saw you and your brother I knew there was something different about you two.

**Carlos: **( So she already knows about us not being from here, if that's the case than let's see what she knows so far. ) Alright so what is it that you want from me, I assume that you're trying to convince me join you if you promise to keep my secret safe right? Kind of cliche don't you think?

She then backed away from me as she went back to standing next to Ironwood who remained silent and perfectly still this whole time.

**Cinder: **Oh no that isn't what I'm after. If anything I want to do my part and show you the reality of your situation.

She then then reached into her sleeve and pulled out a small centipede like Grimm with a black body, white legs and pincers and glowing yellow eyes.

**Cinder: **Have you ever seen a Grimm such as this before? Nasty little things to be sure but quite useful in the correct hands.

She then turned to Ironwood and placed the Grimm on his shoulder, a second or two later and another one came out from his ear. It was totally gross and I had to control myself from throwing up as I saw Ironwood didn't even flinch from that.

**Cinder: **These types of Grimm are quite unique, while they may not possess the strength and size of a normal Grimm they do have an interesting way of taking down even some of the strongest of their kind.

**Carlos: **Let me guess, judging from what I just saw one goes into its victim while the other tells it what to do right?

**Cinder: **Correct. Normally they always need to be in close range of one another for it to work but I had some help with that along with making it so I could put in some of my own personal commands, I'm sure you know who I'm talking about.

**Carlos: **Salem.

She simply smiled at my response, the Grimm then retreated back into where they were hiding before.

**Carlos: **So Ironwood only went after me because you told him to?

**Cinder: **Not exactly, if anything I "persuaded" him. He was willing to trust you at first, even if you didn't seem trustworthy in the beginning he was going to give you the benefit of the doubt, but all I did was dig in to his fears. A man like him can be easily broken when war is just over the horizon, the secrets that he has been allowed to know can just as easily be a curse as well as a gift. I'm sure you can relate. After that it was a simple task of pushing him in the right direction and now here you are. All the pieces are coming into place, and there is nothing you can do.

So all of this was her plan, it makes sense why she and her group didn't come after us in the beginning. Not to mention that she already knew we weren't from here as well. Now what am I supposed to do? Just then I saw Mercury come in with Emerald right behind him.

**Mercury: **Hey can we wrap this up already, I don't think Em can fool these guys much longer.

I looked over and I could tell she was having some difficulty keeping her semblance going for this long. Guess that explains why none of the soldiers thought anything wrong was happening right now.

**Cinder: **Well I guess our time together is just about up. Let's go you two, we still have some things we need to prepare for.

**Mercury: **Hang on for a minute Cinder, there's something I have to do before we go.

He came up to me with a smug look on his face as he didn't hesitate to kick me in the stomach at full strength, it took all I had to keep myself from screaming in pain. Luckily for me my aura had replenished itself since I got here and I wasn't about to give him the satisfaction of him seeing me in pain.

**Carlos: **What's wrong Merc? Struck a nerve?

**Mercury: **Oh so you can still joke around huh? How about this!!!

He kicked me again even harder that time, I felt the wind knocked out of me from that one, but I still had enough sense to make fun of him.

**Carlos: **You call... that a kick? That... was nothing.

**Mercury: **You stupid little...

**Cinder: **Mercury that's enough, let's go.

As they left with Ironwood right behind them I was left all alone in my cell again. Now I knew that Cinder was behind this and I had even more reason to worry about everyone else. I had to get out here and fast.

( Blake's pov )

This had to be nightmare, there's just no other way to explain what just happened. It couldn't be true, all I had to do was wake up and everything would go back to normal. My team would be preparing for the next round and Carlos and I could just spend the day together again like before... all I had to do was wake up...

**Ruby: **Blake we're here, let's go and find Ozpin.

No matter how much I tried to convince myself I knew it was for nothing. After seeing what happened at the arena I knew I couldn't just sit back and watch from the sidelines, if Ozpin had the answers I needed than I needed to confront him. As we got of the bullhead after it dropped us off at Beacon we headed straight for the Headmaster's office while trying to ignore the comments people were making around us. Most of them were about Carlos getting arrested, others were about me trying to go against the military when I tried to help him, and some... some were comments about how I didn't hide my ears anymore. I figured since pretty much everyone who was watching the tournament saw them than there was no point in hiding them anymore so I put away my bow and I wore both of Carlos' swords on my back along with my own. Just as we were about to enter the building Cardin and his team stood in our way before we could get inside.

**Blake: **Get out of the way Cardin, we need to see Ozpin now.

**Cardin: **Why? So you can see if he can get that stupid spider back into Beacon? If you ask me Ironwood is doing everyone a favor by getting rid of that disgusting bug.

**Yang: **Watch it Cardin, we're not in the mood to deal with you or your team so back off!!!

**Cardin: **Yeah right, like we're going to be afraid of a bunch of little girls. Ya know I think Ironwood should've done the right thing and pulled the trigger on him when he had the chance.

That was the last straw, before anyone could stop me I rushed at Cardin and pushed him against the wall while holding Elucidator in a reverse grip with the edge of the blade at his throat, I could handle people insulting me for what I am, but no one should ever say that a person deserves to die as a joke.

**Cardin: **So what are you gonna do now huh? Are you going to try and kill me, that's just like a Faunus, all of you are just disgusting animals that deserve to rot in... Augh!!!!

I pushed the edge of the blade deeper into him while kneeing him in the stomach, I felt so much anger that I wanted to make him suffer. Just as I was about to keep going I felt a hand on my shoulder and turned to see Weiss with a pleading look in her eyes as she tried to calm me down.

**Weiss: **Blake, that's enough. He isn't worth it, let's go find Ozpin.

I let myself calm down as I saw the rest of my team wanting me to do the same, I let Cardin go and he and the rest of his team ran away while we continued forward, but not before Ruby tripped him and Yang kicked him between the legs. We made our way to the elevator and began our ascent to Ozpin's office.

**Blake: **Guys, I want to apologize. I shouldn't have let my emotions get the better of me back there.

**Ruby: **Blake it's fine, we understand that you're just upset and worried. I honestly don't think anyone of us would have done things differently if it were us in the same situation.

**Yang: **She's right. We're talking about someone very important to you, to all of us. We just have to keep our heads focused on what we should do next and not rush into things if we can help it.

**Weiss: **Besides you heard Ironwood, we still have time before he and the rest of his forces head back to Atlas, that means we still have time to come up with a plan to rescue Carlos before it's too late.

**Blake: **But what about the tournament?

**Weiss: **Do you honestly think we care about that? Right now getting our friend back is far more important.

**Ruby/Yang: **Yeah!!!!

I couldn't believe what I was seeing, they would willingly give up their spot in the Vytal Tournament just to help bring a friend back home. I was so touched by them that I began tearing up a little as we embraced in a group hug.

**Blake: **( sniff ) Thank you, so much.

Soon the elevator stopped at the top floor and the doors opened as we then came face to face with both Ozpin and Ms. Goodwitch as we prepared ourselves for what we might get ourselves into. It's time we learned the truth of what was really going on and once we did there would be no turning back.

**Ozpin: **I've been expecting you.

**Blake: **Ozpin, we need to talk.


	13. Chapter13

**Ruby: Hey everybody it's me Ruby Rose! Happy Thanksgiving!!!**

**Hey Ruby that's my line!!!!**

**Ruby: Sorry I was just too excited. Hey where's Weiss?**

**Weiss: I'm right here and thanks for leaving me alone with the turkey by the way you two!**

**Sorry. So where are Yang and Blake? Ruby said they had a surprise for me today.**

**Yang: Well no need to worry cuz here we are!!**

**Awesome so what's this surprise you two have... what the heck is with that giant pine tree!!!!!!**

**Blake: Well since Christmas is only about a month away we decided to prepare early.**

**Yang: Not only that but look above you.**

**Is that mistletoe?**

**Yang: Uh huh, now pucker up cutie~.**

**Blake: Hey no fair I saw him first!!**

**Yang: Sorry Blake but I called dibs.**

**Blake: Oh no you don't!!!!**

**H-H-Hey calm down you two.**

**Blake/Yang: Cerberus who do you want to kiss?!**

**I-I uh, Ruby, Weiss help please!**

**Ruby/Weiss: Sorry you're on your own.**

**Hey bro can you help me out here!**

***_beep* *beep*_**

**I got a text, it says**

**" _Ur on ur own "_**

**Why you little traitor!!!!**

**Blake/Yang: Ceeerrrbeerrruuusss~**

***GULP!!***

**Help!!!!!!!**

**Blake/Yang: Get back here!!!!!!**

**-10 minutes later-**

**RWBY: HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!!!!!!**

**Secret of the Knight and Warrior part 2**

( Ozpin's pov )

As I reviewed the footage from the coliseum I tried so hard to find that crucial piece of evidence that would prove that James has been behaving irrationally for the last few days, but so far everything I reviewed led to nothing but another dead end.

**Goodwitch: **Professor, are you sure you cannot convince Ironwood that this whole mess involving Mr. Ortiz is completely unorthodox.

**Ozpin:** Believe me I have tried all that I could to make him understand, yet for some reason he is set in his ways. As much as it pains me to say this, I'm afraid there is nothing we can do except wait.

**Goodwitch: **But he's condemning a child to death! A CHILD!!! How can we call ourselves teachers if we can't help our students in their time of need!!

She was right, I knew that what Ironwood was doing goes beyond everything he was trained to believe in, and yet for some reason he won't even bat an eye on the decision to give a child the death penalty in front of everyone. Our moment of silence was broken when the elevator rang and as its doors opened all of team RWBY approached. I had a feeling I knew why they came up to see me, if my instincts were correct than I believe our time... or rather that _my _time was nearing its end.

**Ozpin: **I've been expecting you.

**Blake: **Ozpin, we need to talk.

( Blake's pov )

On the outside I tried to appear as confident as possible for what we were about to do, but on the inside I was somewhat terrified of what we might find out.

**Blake: **( Once we begin there's absolutely no turning back. I can do this right? What if... what if everything we've been through was all just an act? )

I had to cast aside thoughts like that, deep down I knew that there might be things I may not want to find out, but I also knew that we weren't going this far if it didn't mean something to us. I took another step forward with the others right behind me showing the same confidence as I did.

**Blake: **Professor Ozpin, tell us what you know about Carlos and Jonathan. We want the truth, all of it!

He simply sighed as he readjusted his glasses before giving us his undivided attention. Both him and Ms. Goodwitch seemed to understand that we weren't going to accept anything less than the truth and that we were going to be as persistent as possible if need be.

**Ozpin: **Very well, I can see that we can't persuade you, but before I say anything else I wish to warn you.

**Weiss: **Warn us about what exactly?

**Ozpin: **The information I'm going to give you is not something to be taken lightly. In fact by the time you learn the truth it's possible you'll wish you didn't.

We all took a moment to think about this, as I did I thought about the mark Carlos showed me on his back and how upset he seemed that night. If there was anything he wished for me to know he knew Ozpin was the only person who could tell us. I gripped my necklace tightly and took a deep breath as I we all agreed to listen.

**Ozpin: **Very well.

He then reached into his desk and pulled out a small book, it looked really old like something that you would find in a museum and placed it on the desk for all of us to see.

**Ozpin: **Tell me, are the four of you familiar with the legends of Remnant?

**Yang: **If you're talking about the stories that our parents used to tell us as kids than yeah, I honestly don't think there isn't a single person who isn't familiar with at least one of those stories.

**Ruby: **My mother would usually read stories to us about heroes and that's one of the reasons why I want to become a huntress.

**Ozpin: **Well what if I were to tell you that there's one story that only a select few individuals even knew existed.

**Blake: **Professor Ozpin what exactly are you talking about?

He then opened the book and turned it to the page were the story of the four Maidens was written, at first we weren't sure what that story had to do with any of this until he turned the page. We saw an illustration of two chess pieces, a black king piece with an aura of red, gold and bright blue. The next piece was a white king with an aura of red, blue, black and white.

**Ozpin: **Tell me, do the pieces in this illustration seem familiar to you?

It took a moment but then I remembered our initiation, these were the exact same pieces that Carlos and Jonathan found around the ruins. Not only that but the aura surrounding the pieces in the book is the same as their aura as well.

**Ozpin: **As I said before, there is only a small handful of people who know this legend exists, there's even fewer who know that this book I'm showing you is even real.

**Blake: **Why are you showing us this?

He turned the page once again and the illustration showed two young men bowing in front of the four Maidens, one was wearing armor like a knight with the helmet removed, the other was wearing a tattered cloak with two swords strapped to his back.

**Ozpin: **There is a legend that has long been forgotten by many. It is said that when Remnant would face its darkest days than the Maidens would bring into the world two champions in an attempt to help destroy the forces that conspire against our world.

For some reason Carlos' swords felt heavier, I had a feeling I knew what he might say next but I decided to let him continue.

**Ozpin: **The youngest of those champions would be a knight full of pride and a sharp mind, clad in armor of red and gold that would allow him to combat even some of the most dangerous of enemies. The eldest would be a warrior who possesses the heart of a human and the soul of the humble spider. Brothers both in blood and faith that would awaken to who they truly are upon reaching a beacon that would set them on their destined path.

**Ruby: **Wait, so are you trying to tell us that both Jonathan and Carlos are the champions from this legend?

**Weiss: **It does seem hard to believe... but at the same time I can see the similarities between the two of them and what's written here. It says they have to reach a beacon, it may be referring to Beacon Academy.

**Goodwitch: **I know this is a lot to take in, but the four of you must understand that there are greater things at work here. I believe there are reasons each of us are born into the world, and as much as the situation seems hopeless right now I know deep down each of you have faith that there is still a way to change things.

As we continued to stare at the illustration we heard the sound of an engine in the distance, we looked out the window and saw Jonathan flying towards us. Ozpin then let him inside as he retracted his helmet and by the look on his face he had something on his mind.

**Jonathan: **Ozpin you've got some explaining to do.

**Ozpin: **Is everything alright Mr. Stark?

**Jonathan: **No everything's not alright, do you mind explaining why I'm starting to hear voices and seeing things that aren't supposed to be here!

**Goodwitch: **Please calm down, just take a moment to breathe and explain what it is that you saw and heard on your way here.

**Jonathan: **It's like I said, why am I seeing things that aren't really there and why is there a voice speaking to me inside my head?

At first we thought he might be succumbing to stress but we could tell that he wasn't making any of this up. Ozpin simply got up and walked over to him, he then placed his hand over the reactor on Jonathan's chest and began to focus his aura, when he did it seemed to have a reaction as Jonathan quickly backed away in pain while trying to reach a spot on his back.

**Ozpin: **Mr. Stark, would you kindly remove your armor and show us your back.

**Jonathan: **What?!

I knew what Ozpin had in mind, if his suspicions were correct than Jonathan should also have a mark as well.

**Blake: **Jonathan, please do as he says.

He looked at me as I nodded to him. He retracted the upper part of his armor and lifted up his shirt, as he turned we all were shocked at what we saw, a black mark that resembled some sort of metallic mask, like the other mark it made me feel uneasy just looking at it. I quickly took a picture of it on my scroll and showed it to him, he quickly became angry as he reformed his armor and faced Ozpin.

**Jonathan: **

Ozpin what's the meaning of this! Tell me the truth right now!

**Ozpin: **Very well. Do you remember the artifacts you and your brother found during initiation.

**Jonathan: **What about them.

**Ozpin: **There was a specific reason why you and Carlos were the only ones who were able to find them. According to legend it has been said that before the original Maidens left this world they received a vision, a vision of a world that was meant to be shrouded in darkness unless two champions were to be called in their time of need. In order to prepare for this they infused two pieces of crystal with a portion of their power which would respond when two specific souls came of age, ready to battle with those they deemed worthy to fight alongside them. However in order to ensure that the two souls harbored no ill intentions a curse was imbued in order to protect the innocent should our enemies persuade you to join them, but also to keep certain moments intact.

**Yang: **Hold on a second, Uncle Qrow told us that whatever curse they had it could only be from the person whose aura they came into contact with.

After hearing that Jonathan grabbed Ozpin by his neck and slammed him to the wall with his gauntlet aimed at him.

**Jonathan: **Is that true?! Were you the one who cursed us this whole time?!

We were all afraid that Ozpin was about to be killed but Yang went over to him and simply placed her hand on his shoulder as she tried to calm him down.

**Yang: **Jonathan just let him explain himself.

He complied as he backed away from him to allow him to continue. After a minute or so Ozpin had recovered enough to explain why he cursed them.

**Ozpin: **It is true that the curse could only take hold once the bearers come into contact with the casters aura, however the curse was already inside you both when you came into contact with the artifacts.

**Jonathan: **What about the mark on my back, does Carlos have one too?!

**Blake: **He does. Last night we went outside for a little bit and he showed me this black spider symbol on his back, when I looked at it it was like a burn mark and it felt evil to me. What do they mean?

**Jonathan: **( sigh ) If I had to guess than it's likely that what you saw on Carlos was Venom's symbol.

**Ruby: **Who's Venom?

**Jonathan: **It's a long story, but I guess it makes sense if I have Ultron's face myself.

**Weiss: **Jonathan can you please tell us what you're talking about, I don't think any of us understand what you mean.

**Jonathan: **I guess the easiest way to describe it would be that the marks you see represent... a dark side in a way. The voice in my head belongs to Ultron and it keeps telling me to let go of myself to become superior to those around me.

**Yang: **That's pretty creepy, so does that mean Carlos is hearing this Venom guy in his head right now?

**Jonathan: **If he has his symbol it's possible. Still why is this happening?

**Ozpin: **If your hypothesis is true and these marks represent what you consider to be a dark part of yourself, than it is likely a trial of the mind. Something that the two of you must overcome if you are to succeed in your journey.

This was a lot for all of us to take in, whatever it is that we were just told basically took our perception of what was real and myth and turned it upside down, I guess this is what Ruby and Yang's uncle meant when he said we'll be questioning these kinds of things.

Soon after that Jonathan simply left, when we asked him where he was going he just told us he was preparing for war. We weren't sure if he meant he was going to fight against the military or something else but he isn't the type of person to act irrationally so we decided to trust him. We wanted to ask Ozpin if there was anything else we needed to know about Carlos and Jonathan but he told us that if wanted answers we would be better off asking them personally. We then got a notification on our scroll about the next fight in the doubles round about to start, we told Ozpin that we wanted to withdraw from the tournament and he agreed, after that we went back to our dorm and spent the next few hours going over everything we were told.

**Ruby: **So what do we do now?

**Yang: **Honestly I'm not sure, this whole thing is making my head spin.

**Weiss: **Me too, but whatever we come up with we better get started soon otherwise we'll be too late.

Not much later the others decided to get some sleep, but I remained awake as I kept replying everything that happened today over and over again. Around midnight I snuck out of my room and headed for Jonathan's room, I knocked on his door and he answered a few seconds later with a tired look in his eyes.

**Jonathan: **What did you need Blake?

**Blake: **You said you were preparing for war. I would like to join you.


	14. Chapter14

**Operation Breakout **

( Blake's pov )

This was it, according to Jonathan today was our last chance to rescue Carlos before he was taken to Atlas. It's been a few days since the doubles round began, because of the attack the military started during the exhibition match the battlefield was somewhat damaged and the next set of fights had to be limited in order for the necessary repairs to be made without taking too much time away from the rest of the fights. Later tonight the singles fights would start and for the last few days I have been training rigorously using the same training program Carlos used, actually I wasn't the only one since the rest of my team decided to join. When I went to talk to Jonathan about joining him the other girls secretly followed me and they have been training along side me since.

Each one of us was set to fight a holographic enemy that was preprogrammed and right now I was busy going up against an enemy with four metallic arms coming from its back. It was rather difficult trying to get past it, its movements were surprisingly fast and whenever I got hit it felt like being knocked over with a ton of bricks. I couldn't rely on my semblance since the training program manages to constantly keep us on our toes. On the other side of the training hall I took notice of the others and how they were doing; Ruby was fighting against an enemy that resembled a giant lizard in a tattered lab coat, Yang was fighting what looked like sand in human form, and finally Weiss was having a difficult time fighting a floating enemy that could shoot electricity.

**Ruby: **Seriously how does Carlos handle this kind of simulation anyway!!!

**Yang:** You're guess is as good as mine, this isn't even on maximum difficulty and we're still not making that much progress!!!

**Weiss: **

Stop complaining!! We're the ones who wanted this so let's keep it up!!!

I had to admit, even when we may not know the full story of what's going on the fact that we still stick together to fight for a common goal is such a great comfort, and I promise to make all our hard work worth it no matter what.

**Jonathan: **Trust me, you may feel like this might be a bit much, but with what we're about to go up against we'll need every advantage we can get.

We kept going for another 30 minutes or so and in the end we managed to survive, after taking a quick break Jonathan came over to me and gave me a USB and Carlos' mask.

**Jonathan: **Before we continue I want to go over the plan one last time with the rest of you.

**RWBY: **Right!

He then formed his gauntlet and had it project a large hologram of a small Atlas bullhead. As I took a look at it I felt really anxious, mostly because we had until tonight to accomplish this. After that... well Jonathan could only tell us that we had to fight as if our life depended on it.

**Jonathan: **As we know, tonight is our last chance to get my brother back. Not only that but we have some other issues we need to deal with.

**Yang: **Hey there's something I think we need to know.

**Jonathan: **What is it?

**Yang: **Back when we found out about your curse Carlos said something about that transfer student Cinder. He said that she must fall. Tell us... is she a danger to us?

**Jonathan: **( sigh ) All I can tell you for certain is that she isn't to be trusted, that said if one of you manages to confront her, don't try taking her on by yourself understand.

**Weiss: **A-Alright, so let's go over the plan again.

**Jonathan: **Right, as I said today is our last chance so Blake will be in charge of getting Carlos free. I'll let you use my stealth armor and I'll control it remotely to take you to the bullhead where he's being kept, not only that but you'll also have my brothers stealth tech for when you get inside. Once you do just connect the USB to any computer and Carlos can use the tech in his mask to upload the virus I made.

**Ruby: **Why did you need to create a virus for?

**Jonathan: **The virus is designed to specifically target all Atlas military tech except for their bullheads. It will forcefully shut them down temporarily, including Penny.

Ruby wasn't particularly happy about that, back when we started to prepare for today Jonathan revealed that Penny was an advanced android by the military, she was the first machine that was capable of generating an aura. While he did ensure that she wouldn't be harmed from the virus he insisted that it was for the best.

**Jonathan: **While Blake handles that I need Weiss and Yang to stay in the city, I'm going to need both of you to keep an eye on things and be ready for the worst.

**Yang/Weiss: **Right!

**Jonathan: **Ruby, I need you at the coliseum, if you find Pyhrra and Penny hasn't been shut down yet then tell her to let Penny win. Not only that but I'm gonna need you to find either Mercury or Emerald and distract them long enough until I finish preparing my part of the plan.

**Ruby: **Okay but what exactly is your part of the plan?

**Jonathan: **You just let me worry about that, now let's get going we begin in 15 minutes. After that we have around an hour until the one on one fights start, this is our best opportunity to strike while the military's distracted.

We then began getting our equipment ready, for me that included my weapon as well as Carlos' swords and after everyone else left to their assigned location Jonathan approached me with his stealth armor in its compact form.

**Jonathan: **Listen before you go, I just wanted to thank you.

**Blake: **What for?

**Jonathan: **For being you. Because of you I think my brother has become a stronger person than he used to be. So thank you.

He then gave me a hug that I quickly gave back, he was putting so much faith in me and I wasn't about to let him down.

**Jonathan: **Make sure to bring that idiot brother of mine back home for me.

**Blake: **I will.

**Jonathan: **Alright let's do this.

He handed me his armor and I put it on, in a few seconds I was completely suited up. I had to admit it was really amazing, the technology incorporated into the armor was extremely advanced that I highly doubt many people could understand how it works. As I took off my only thought was about bringing my boyfriend back home, after several minutes of flight I reached my destination, fortunately the stealth mode worked like a charm and I easily made it to the bullhead without any problems. I landed on the ships blind spot and removed the armor as I quickly switched to using Carlos' stealth tech as the armor flew back towards Beacon. Getting inside wasn't overly difficult since all I had to do was wait for the patrol units to open the doors so I could sneak in and since all the guards were robots I had no problems eliminating them, I even took priority in destroying their cameras just in case. After 20 minutes of searching I found him and I used my gun to shoot the lock.

( Normal pov )

You can't believe how insanely bored I am right now, I've been in here for days with nothing to do other than talk to myself in this stupid cell. The food here is terrible, or at least I think it is since they haven't fed me since I got here and I was super hungry and I could really go for a burger right now.

**Carlos: **You know back home this is considered strange and unusual punishment right! Geez would it kill you guys to get me a burger or something?!

All of a sudden I hear what sounds like machinery getting destroyed rather violently, gun shots and something hitting the door of my cell really hard.

**Carlos: **Yikes, I never thought it would _actually _kill them.

Soon I heard another round of gunshots and then the cell doors opened up, the guns that were trained on me then switched to the intruder and fired, only for them to be destroyed a second later by someone or something that wasn't there. What got me even more confused was that suddenly I felt someone grab my face and kiss me pretty passionately. At first I thought I finally lost my mind after being in solitude for the last couple of days and the hunger I was forced to endure, only for Blake to suddenly appear in front of me with my stealth tech in her hands.

**Carlos: **Blake?!

**Blake: **Carlos.

She began tearing up as she hugged me, honestly it felt really nice to have her close to me again. After that she took her gun and aimed it just above my restraints and destroyed them with some well placed shots. Once I was free she handed me back my swords and my mask.

**Carlos: **Thanks Blake, I owe you one.

**Blake: **You can thank me by telling me what I want to know.

I knew she would bring this up eventually, however I already made up my mind and decided to tell her everything I could.

**Carlos: **Blake I promise you that I'll tell you what you want to know once this is all over, I just don't know what I'm allowed to tell you with this mark on my back. But...

I gave her a warm hug and kiss, she seemed a little surprised but quickly sunk into it.

**Carlos: **One thing I can tell you is that I love you. Don't ever doubt that alright.

**Blake: **Heh, alright. Now let's get moving.

Soon after that we made our way to the main control room and made quick work of the military bots stationed there as well as getting my scroll and web shooters back. Blake then began uploading the virus Jonathan created and I used my mask to follow the preprogrammed instructions to ensure everything went smoothly.

**Blake: **How's it looking?

**Carlos: **So far so good, see if you can get one of these monitors to show the tournament.

Once she did we saw Pyhrra fighting against Penny, so far it played out exactly as it did before, but just as Penny was about to go in for a strike she suddenly fell to her knees. To everybody watching it looked like she wasn't feeling well but according to my mask the virus was successfully working it's way into her internal system and we got a transmission from another airship notifying us that several Atlas robots began shutting down across the city.

**Carlos: **I think we did it.

**Blake: **Great, now let's get out of here.

**Carlos: **Okay, just let me activate the autopilot on this thing and we can land and get out of here.

Unfortunately things don't always go the way we want them to, we heard screaming and when we looked at the monitor we saw Pyhrra use her semblance to brutality rip Penny apart. We both stood there horrified at what we witnessed, not only that but the alarms began blaring and footage of what was going on across Vale appeared. All over the city Atlas robots came back online and began attacking innocent civilians.

**Blake: **What's happening?!

Soon the screen changed and I knew Cinder began to take over.

**Carlos: **No we're too late!!!!

**Blake: **Carlos look outside!

I did and I saw a swarm of Grimm filling up the sky, if this was any indication than that means the streets weren't any better. Soon the ship began to rock really violently as one of the turbines became severely damaged and we started to lose altitude.

**Blake: **What happened?!

**Carlos: **One of the turbines got damaged, we're going down!!!

**Blake: **Please tell me you have a plan!!!

I did, a completely crazy and insane idea but it was all I had.

**Carlos: **I do, but I'm gonna have to go outside for it to work! Just stay here while I get the job done!

As I was about to leave she suddenly grabbed my hand and had a determined look on her face.

**Blake: **You're not doing anything crazy... at least not without me. I'm coming with you.

I didn't have any time to argue, so while I hated this I agreed to let her join me. We then made our way outside as we began picking up speed, I had Blake use her weapons ribbon to keep her tied to me so it would be easier for her to hold on to me. Luckily for us this bullhead wasn't all that big, it was smaller in comparison to the others so hopefully my plan would work, we began getting a better view of the city below as we were about to fall between two tall buildings, I shot several web lines to each building and attached them to the bullhead and held on as tight as I could.

**Carlos: **( grunting ) I guess this is the plan!!!

As we began to swing we thankfully avoided crashing into a fiery death, of course things just had to get complicated... curse you bad luck!!!!

**Blake: **Carlos one of the turbines came off!!!

**Carlos: **What?!

I looked behind me and one of the functioning turbines was rolling down the street when we avoided crashing, I had to get it out of the way otherwise someone might get hurt.

**Carlos: **( grunting ) Come on Carlos you got this!!! You got this!!!! You got this!!!! You got this!!!!

**Blake: **I think you mean _we _got this!!!!

With some help from Blake I managed to get my aim just right and I shot my webs at the turbine and pulled it out of way of civilians that were trying to escape from some Grimm by attaching it to one of the nearby buildings. As we reached the height of our swing the web lines snapped and the ship was about to drop once again.

**Carlos: **Hang on Blake!!

**Blake: **Okay!!

As the ship began falling I quickly jumped off with Blake holding me extra tight, during the fall I decided to use my web shooters on automatic fire simultaneously with my organic webbing to stop the crash.

**Carlos: **Please don't screw this up.

I fired a barrage of webbing that managed to successfully encase the bullhead in a large web strong enough to catch it safely as I landed while hanging on to Blake.

**Carlos: **Blake you okay?

**Blake: **Yeah.

After getting ourselves untied I dropped us down to the ground and everything began playing as it did before, the city being overrun by Grimm and Atlas robots attacking innocent people.

**Blake: **What's happening?

**Carlos: **Blake listen we need to head over to Beacon as fast as possible.

**Blake: **Wait why do we have to go back?

**Carlos: **I know you may not want to hear this but... Adam Taurus is on his way to Beacon and if we don't stop him than even more innocent people may get hurt.

I knew that Adam was the last person she wanted to see ever again, but she agreed and we began making our way back to Beacon while taking down as many Grimm as possible. It wasn't easy, we were pretty far away from Beacon and every time we came across another robot it began trying to kill me like I was a priority target. Luckily I had enough pent up anger I needed to get out and this was the perfect opportunity for me.

**Carlos: **Alright you overgrown tin cans here I come!!

I began slashing robots left and right, every time they tried shooting at me I deflected their shots and with some help from Blake we managed to make quick work of them and continued towards our destination. Soon enough we ran into Yang as she was finishing off some Grimm that managed to cut some of her hair... again.

**Yang: **( pant ) Just how many... ( pant ) are there?

**Carlos: **You don't wanna know.

**Yang: **Carlos!!!

She quickly ran up to me and tackled me in a very strong hug, unfortunately for me I couldn't breathe and I thought I saw my life flashing before my eyes.

**Carlos: **Air... need... air...

Once she noticed I was dying of suffocation she let go, I also didn't notice at the time but she was blushing the whole time like Blake does when we cuddle.

**Yang: **Sorry about that, I was so worried about you that I got over excited.

**Carlos: **

It's cool, so where's everyone else?

**Yang: **Ruby's over at the coliseum, she was told to find either Mercury or Emerald and distract them while Weiss and I stayed here in the city.

**Carlos: **I guess the plan didn't go so well, if only we'd gotten to them sooner.

**Blake: **What do you mean?

**Carlos: **Emerald's semblance allows her to create illusions, back at the bullhead when Penny was destroyed I noticed Pyhrra looked shocked and confused. It's possible she _believed _she was in danger and responded by using her polarity on Penny by accident.

**Yang: **Okay that makes sense, so what do we do now?

Just then we heard the growling of a large horde of Grimm heading straight for us, as we prepared to fight back they were suddenly blasted away by several rockets that left nothing behind.

**Jonathan: **Now we keep fighting.

Looking behind us we saw Jonathan all armored up and ready to kick some Grimm butt.

**Carlos: **Glad you could join the party little bro.

**Jonathan: **Thanks, but I'm not the only one arriving. JARVIS is it ready?

**JARVIS: **Yes Sir, shall I active them now?

**Jonathan: **Yes. Engage Iron Legion protocol.

Suddenly we looked at the skies above us and were completely stunned as an army of various Iron Man armors began flying into the city and quickly fought back.

**Blake: **Incredible, how did you manage to create your own army so fast?

**Jonathan: **I've been working on this since our first week of Beacon. Never underestimate the genius of Jonathan Stark.

**Carlos: **This is so awesome!!! There's your Arctic Armor, your Space Armor and... your Rubber Ducky Armor?

**Yang: **Seriously, it's called Rubber Ducky? That's hilarious!!!

**Jonathan: **Like you could come up with a better name Blondie.

**Carlos: **Okay all joking aside we need to get back to Beacon, Adam is on his way there and we need to stop him now.

**Jonathan: **No problem, I can let you borrow one of my armors but it'll only drop you off. I can't afford to let one of my armors to be away for too long if we want to keep casualties low.

I agreed and he called over the War Machine Armor for me to pilot. This was so awesome but I didn't have time to enjoy it as I picked up Blake in my arms and began flying to Beacon. As we flew the vision I had a few days ago about me getting impaled kept playing in my mind, I haven't told anyone about my visions because I didn't want them to worry more than usual, right now we had to focus on the fight at hand and hope that we can change the outcome. The time has come for the cat and the spider to face off against the raging bull.


	15. Chapter15

**Fall of Beacon part 1- The Spider, the Cat and the Bull**

Everywhere we go the screams of people running in fear can be heard loud and clear throughout the city of Vale. Buildings collapsed, fires burned, Grimm and Atlas robots attacking innocent civilians left and right with as many huntsman and huntresses and local police doing all they can to get things under control. As I continued to make my way towards Beacon with Blake in my arms I felt this cold sense of dread wash over me, I wasn't sure how this was going to end, actually that was a bit of a lie since that vision I received pretty much showed me getting impaled, but that wasn't going to stop me from doing what had to be done.

**Carlos: **Alright let's start searching, the sooner we find Adam the better.

**Blake: **Right.

As we landed I quickly got out of the armor as it flew back into Vale to help my brother defend the city. Blake and I began to run through the ruined buildings of Beacon Academy and along the way we found ourselves face to face with several White Fang soldiers and we made quick work of them.

**Carlos:** Get out of our way!! We don't have time to waste on a couple of grunts like you!!

A few of them tried to attack me with their weapons, unfortunately for them I was able to easily dodge their attacks and Blake easily disarmed them before knocking them out which allowed me to use my webbing to secure them for the authorities to escort them to prison later.

**Blake:** I think that's all of them for now, any ideas where Adam could be?

Before I could respond I felt my spider sense tingling like crazy as I turned around and managed to block an attack from above that came from none other than the White Fangs resident raging bull.

**Adam:** So you managed to block my attack, not bad.

**Carlos:** Adam!!!

As we separated form our clash I went in for a few strikes with my swords but he was able to easily dodge and deflect my strikes before backing away from me and getting some distance between himself and us. I looked towards Blake and I saw that she was visibly terrified, her body was shaking slightly and the look of fear on her face made me worry about whether or not she would be able to fight against him.

**Blake:** No... Adam.

**Adam:** Hello, my darling.

Slowly I made my way back to Blake while keeping my focus on Adam, I wasn't about to let my guard down against someone like him. Every instinct in my body told me that I should run away before I could get killed, even so there was no way I was going to leave Blake alone with him. I promised her that I would be there for her when she needed me and I was going to prove that right here right now.

**Carlos:** Sorry to break it to you but she isn't your _darling_.

**Adam:** Ah yes, she has a new favorite. So you're the famous Spider-Man, the faunus that has betrayed his own kind in order to protect the people of this city.

**Carlos:** And you're Adam Taurus, the lunatic who thinks he's in charge of the White Fang. I don't think the two of us have ever been properly introduced, I'm the guy who's gonna stop your plans.

**Adam: **You're more than welcome to try, unfortunately for you this is only the beginning of our revolution. Once the ignorant fools of the city have been all but wiped out there will be no one else that dares to stand in our way.

**Carlos: **And you honestly believe that senseless slaughter will bring more people over to your side?

**Adam: **It's a basic rule of nature, the strong survive while the weak perish. Any faunus that make it through today have a place in the future that I am building for them.

**Carlos: **What about the innocent humans, I guess you have no intention of letting any of them survive.

**Adam: **Actually I think it's about time they finally got what they deserved. I think we could use some slaves of our own. What do you think my love?

I glanced over to Blake and she was equally scared and disgusted at what her former partner had become. It was obvious that the "equality" he once fought for had become twisted into something far darker than what he originally wanted.

**Blake: **Why are you doing this?

**Adam: **You and I were going to change the world, remember? We were destined to light the fires of revolution! Consider this... a spark.

**Carlos: **That's enough!!!

I rushed at him as he defended himself, we then began to exchange blows between or swords. Sparks began to fly with every clash of our blades, I had to admit that Adam was even better at sword fighting than I thought, I knew if I slipped up for even a second it would be over for me. Still, his twisted ideals have already hurt so many innocent people, both human and faunus alike have suffered because of their fear and hatred towards each other and someone like Adam would only make things worse for those who actually want to close the gap between our two species and I wanted to do my part in ending this cycle of hate.

**Carlos: **People like you make me sick! You're nothing more than a fool that's been blinded by his own hatred to see what he's become!

As we fought I used my guns to shoot him but he easily deflected every shot with his katana and quickly retaliated by trying to do the same to me. I was able to deflect his shots as easily as he did with mine, he then rushed at me with his blade with fast attacks that I barely managed to avoid or deflect.

**Adam: **And what about you? Why do you insist on helping the humans? They have shown nothing but hatred towards us and yet you don't hesitate to save them, what have they ever done for you!!!

**Carlos: **I don't care whether someone is a human or faunus. Being a hero is about helping those in need, even if they hate me it doesn't mean they aren't worth saving!!!

As I put my swords away I began using my webs to try and immobilize him long enough to get in a few hits. Unfortunately he was too fast and he was able to avoid my webs, he tried attacking me with an overhead swing that I was able to block with my arms and aura but I was having a difficult time keeping it up so I got out of it quickly as I backed away to catch my breath.

**Blake: **Are you alright?

**Carlos: **I'm fine. Just need to catch my breath.

**Blake: **Listen we need to get out of here, at this rate we'll end up dead before we make any progress.

**Carlos: **Blake you can't be serious. If we run now then what's going to happen to the innocent people of Vale, I can't just leave them to suffer...

**Blake: **I don't want to lose you!!!!

Her sudden outburst made me stop for a moment. She was beyond scared, she was terrified. I noticed how much she was shivering at the thought of losing me, she began to hold me tight and refused to let go.

**Blake: **I thought I was going to lose you before, I won't take that risk again. Please, for once just be selfish and think about yourself, think about me.

**Adam: **What's this, you wish to run away again? Is this what you've become _my love_? A coward?

**Carlos: **Shut up.

**Adam: **What?

**Carlos: **I said, SHUT UP!!! Blake is a lot of things, she's smart, fun, hardworking, beautiful and easily one of the most amazing people to ever exist. She is that and so much more, but one of the things she isn't is a coward!

As I got back up Blake let go of me as she was still surprised by what I just said.

**Carlos: **The only coward here is you Adam. Rather than take the high road and try to find a peaceful solution for all of this you decided to sell your soul and chose the path of violence and murder!

**Adam: **You're just like all the others, you're too afraid to take action when the situation demands it. This is the only way to get results, this will prove our superiority over the humans that have brought nothing but misery to our kind!!!

**Carlos: **Don't you mean "your" superiority Adam?

**Adam: **What exactly do you mean by that?

In that instant I closed the distance between us and soon we began clashing again. As the sparks between our swords came once again Blake began to understand that no matter how scared I might be, I still chose to stand up and fight. Even if the odds weren't in my favor I still had my reasons for fighting. Slowly she stood up and as I held off Adam's blade with my own she appeared behind him for a surprise attack. He was so busy trying to get to me that he let his guard down, however he managed to dodge it at the last second and jumped back as Blake and I stood side by side ready to fight together.

**Blake: **He means this is your attempt to prove your own superiority over everyone else Adam. All of this won't bring equality to our kind, this is just your attempt at revenge and nothing more!

**Carlos: **When Blake left you and the White Fang that was one of the strongest acts of bravery she has ever committed. You on the other hand have allowed yourself to wallow in despair and anger for so long that you've lost your way. You've had opportunities to turn back and do good but just threw them away out of spite!

From there the two of us fought as a team, Blake managed to hold her own against Adam, meanwhile I used everything at my disposal to gain the advantage. While Blake kept him distracted with her semblance I used my webs to throw some of the debris into him before attacking him with several punches before switching to my swords.

**Adam: **Do you honestly believe you two can win, this only proves that you don't have the power to beat me alone.

**Blake: **Maybe so, still that doesn't mean that we're just going to run away. I refuse to run away ever again.

**Adam: **Trust me, you will.

Adam then retaliated by using his semblance in an attempt to finish us off, Blake was fortunate enough to be far away that she would easily be able to dodge his attack if she had to, I on the other hand didn't have the luxury since I was too close to try and dodge it myself. I did have a plan in mind, a crazy and completely stupid one but it was better than nothing. I focused as much of my aura into my blades that I could spare while infusing as much gravity and lightning dust as possible.

**Adam: **Moonslice!!

**Carlos: **Black Getsuga Tenshou!!

As our two attacks connected, the resulting explosion created enough force that I was sent flying into the cafeteria as it was in the middle of burning to the ground. As I got back up I could feel most of my aura drained out of me, I had a few scratches and parts of my clothes were ruined. My mask was partially covered in blood so I had to remove it so I could see clearly.

**Carlos: **Okay everything hurts... but at least that proves I'm still alive.

**Blake: **Carlos are you alright!?

I saw Blake running towards me and she then helped me up as I had one arm over her shoulder so she could support me properly.

**Blake: **What were you thinking!? Do you have any idea how crazy that was!?

**Carlos: **I know... but on the bright side it bought us some time right?

**Blake: **We'll discuss this later. For now let's get back to the others before... look out!!!

**Carlos: **Huh?!

As she pushed me back I took notice of Adam stabbing her with his katana, as he pushed the blade deeper into her she fell on her back as she screamed in pain. In that moment I recalled what happened during initiation, how she risked her own life just to protect me.

**Carlos: **Blake!!!!

**Yang: **GET AWAY FROM HER!!!!!

In that moment Yang appeared and tried to fight Adam herself, I wanted to warn her to get away and to get Blake somewhere safe, but my voice failed me. I could feel the curse constricting my throat as I could only witness Yang fighting in vain.

**Carlos: **( Please Yang you have to stop this!!!! If you don't you're going to...)

I could only watch in horror as the event played itself in front of me like before, no matter how hard she fought the end result was inevitable. As my curse faded once again I felt something inside me snap. Something that was holding me back no longer mattered to me, all I wanted was...

**Adam: **This is your punishment Blake, for all you have done to go against me and what we stood for I will make it my mission to destroy all you care for. Starting with her...

He then turned to face me with his blade ready to strike.

**Adam: **... and him.

I stood up while continuing to face the floor, as Adam charged at me and swung his blade with intent to kill I simply grabbed his blade before it made contact. My hand began to bleed but I didn't care, the only thought that ran through my mind was ...

**Carlos: **You ruthless, heartless, BASTARD!!!!!

... _MY REVENGE!!!!!!_

**Carlos: **I AM GOING TO MAKE YOU SUFFER!!!!!!

Using my grip on his katana I pulled him close so I could kick him in the head that sent him across the room, I took out my swords and began a relentless assault, I wasn't about to give him a chance to slip away, I was going to end this here and now.

**Venom: **Yes, this is what it means to be free, use your anger, your fury and end his existence once and for all. Let nothing stand in your way from delivering punishment upon him.

As we continued to fight, Blake was able to get up and tried to ignore her injury as she attempted to help get Yang away from here.

**Carlos: **Blake take Yang and get out of here right now!!!

**Blake: **But what about you!?

**Carlos: **Don't worry about me, just go!!!!

**Blake: **But...

**Carlos: **I said go!!!!!!

I quickly faced her and when I did she was terrified at what she saw, half of my face was covered by the markings that it began to resemble Venom's face with my teeth becoming fangs. She could only nod as she got Yang and began running.

**Blake: **Carlos, I don't know what's happened to you but please... don't die on me.

As she took Yang to safety I turned my attention back to Adam and I could feel my dark impulses get the better of me as we continued to fight. No matter how many of his attacks connected I didn't let up as I had every intention of destroying him.

**Adam: **So at long last we see your true face, in the end you are the true monster here.

Every cut, every slash, every stab only served as fuel. I failed to keep the girl I loved and my closest friend safe from harm. The only option I had left was to allow myself to fall into the darkness.

**Carlos: **SHUT UP AND LET ME KILL YOU ALREADY!!!!!!!

As our fight continued the fire began to get worse, it wouldn't be much longer until the whole place collapsed on top of us. With one last clash Adam used all the he had to hold off my swords, I was so sure that my victory was guaranteed that I failed to respond to my spider sense as his semblance activated once again, using what little energy he had stored he managed to not only free himself but also destroy my weapons and my web shooters in the process.

**Adam: **I must admit that you almost had me there, but the end result will be the same. You will fall by my hand and nothing is going to change that.

**Venom: **What do you think? Are you going to allow someone like him to continue living?

**Carlos: **No, he must pay.

**Venom: **Good answer. Make him suffer, make him regret the day he entered this world and show him what real power is.

We rushed each other once more, I dodged everything he threw at me, I used my webs on the surrounding area to pull whatever I could get my hands on and use them as a weapon. I had no intentions on holding back and fought like a wild animal succumbing to pure instinct. As I dodged another swing of his sword I used my organic webbing on his leg and flung him over to some of the burning debris, then I used my webs to pull on one of the support beams above him and brought down part of the ceiling on top of him. As he got up I went in for a web strike that he blocked by using the flat side of his weapon, however I used this to my advantage and managed to get behind him and hit him in the face as he turned to face me. As he fell to the ground I grabbed him by one of his horns and threw him across the room. The fire continued to grow more intense as time went on, as he got back up he felt something strange on his head and went to reach his horns he knew what had happened.

**Adam: **What... what have you done to me!!!!!!

He looked at my hand and he saw that I ripped one of his horns right off of him with a sadistic grin on my face.

**Carlos: **Aww is the big bad bull mad I accidentally took off his precious horn? Don't worry you won't have to stay mad for too long. I plan on ending you right now.

**Adam: **DAMN YOU!!!!

As we fought the cafeteria began falling apart even faster, more of the debris began to fall around us but that didn't matter, all that mattered was ending our opponents life. After exchanging a few more blows the two of us were completely bloody and bruised but I had Adam half conscious and ready to be disposed of. I had his weapon in hand and prepared to land the final blow.

**Venom: **Do it, with this you will end his reign of terror and soon all of the White Fang will know to fear your power. This is your destiny and all you have to do is end his life.

This was it, just one swing of his sword and he will no longer hurt the people I care about. As I prepared to end him I noticed my reflection on one of the broken windows, I was smiling because I beat him... I was smiling that I was going to kill him... I was...

**Carlos: **W-Why am I smiling?

I felt my body shaking,but why though? All I had to do was take his life, so why was I smiling? Is this what I want? Is this what I should be doing?

**Venom: **What are you waiting for!? End him!!! KILL HIM!!!!!

I dropped the sword and began holding my head in pain. This... this isn't me... this isn't who I am!!!!!

**Carlos: **Get out of my head!!!!!!!

I began screaming in pain and terror over my actions, this isn't what I'm supposed to become!

**Carlos: **GET AWAY FROM ME!!!!!!!

As I tried to bring myself back to my senses Adam used this opportunity to get back up and grab his weapon and when I had my back turned he didn't hesitate to stab me through the chest. I stopped as I felt my curse dissipate, I looked down and saw the blade sticking out from me like in my vision. As it was pulled out I fell over and I felt myself fall into unconsciousness as he walked in front of me.

**Adam: **How pathetic... in the end you couldn't bring yourself to finish... the job. Now look at you... lying on the ground... helpless.

He raised his weapon above his head ready to finish me off.

**Adam: **You aren't worthy.

Just before he ended me a sudden flash of light blinded us both. I felt myself being lifted and carried away, when I regained my vision I saw...

**Carlos: **Y-You're...

**Nebula: **I'm Nebula of team NDGO, and we're here to get you to safety.

**Dew: **There's a medical team at the evacuation point. Just hang on a bit longer till we get there.

Before I could properly thank them the world around me became dark and silent. All I could do was put my faith in the others and hope that we changed history.


	16. Chapter16

**Fall of Beacon part 2 - Battle of Beacon: Iron vs Maiden **

( Jonathan's pov )

( several minutes earlier )

This was it, this was the moment that we've been preparing for the last couple of months. As I let Carlos borrow the War Machine armor he took Blake to fight Adam over at Beacon while I remained here in the city to fight off the horde of Grimm with anyone else that was available. So far the Iron Legion Protocol was working like a charm, over the semester I spent most of my free time building as many suits as possible in order to increase our odds of victory. As I managed to take down a small army of Ursai I looked towards the sky as several Nevermore were taken down by my silver Mark 2 armor and my Mark 30 " Blue Steel " armor.

**Jonathan: **Okay so far so good, let's just hope there aren't any more surprises.

**JARVIS: **Sir, there is another pack of Grimm approaching from your left.

I looked over and saw a pack of about 50 heading my way, this was the perfect time to test out my latest project.

**Jonathan: **JARVIS is it ready?

**JARVIS: **Yes Sir, shall I deploy it to your location?

**Jonathan: **Do it.

Soon the rumble of an engine could be heard as my newest set of armor began to arrive in the city. A large rocket like structure began coming into view as its compartments opened up and several armor pieces began flying towards me. As the first set of pieces landed they assembled to form the lower half of my armor, as I flew over to place myself inside the rest of the pieces assembled around me.

**JARVIS: **Grimmbuster armor now online, power is at 100% capacity. Dust energy infusion is successful.

The armors design resembled the one from the MCU with several modifications. The overall build was slightly sleeker with the shoulder guards being more defined as they each housed an arc reactor. The boots were the same with an arc reactor just above the arches. The left gauntlet had fire, water, wind and stone dust on each knuckle and the right had lightning, plant, gravity, and ice. The central reactor on the chest had four hard light dust crystals surrounding it to enhance its firepower.

**Jonathan: **Okay any Grimm that wish to die come and get me. And those who don't...

I raised my right arm and shot one of the Grimm into a building that collapsed on top of it after the impact.

**Jonathan: **... too bad.

As the pack began rushing at me I activated both ice and stone dust as I slammed my hands on the ground which caused spikes to erupt from the ground in front of me that impaled several Grimm. The ones that managed to get out of the way in time weren't going to fare any better as I switched to wind and lightning dust while infusing it onto my repulsers to fire a blast of energy that ripped them to shreds while electrocuting any stragglers.

**Jonathan: **Who's next?

As I continued to tear apart any Grimm that came my way I got a call from Weiss, she said she was on her way back to Beacon to help out the other students along with Yang. I knew my brother wouldn't want Yang there if he wants to prevent her from losing her arm, but right now I had too many Grimm to deal with so I couldn't go after her, I just hoped that he can finish off Taurus before it's too late. As I began to clear the area I got a call from Jaune.

**Jaune: **_Hello... can you hear me!!!! Jonathan I need your help!!!!!_

**Jonathan: **Jaune what's going on.

**Jaune: **_It's Pyhrra, she went after Cinder!_

**Jonathan: **What!? Why!?

**Jaune: **_She's trying to fight her by herself, I told her it was crazy but she went anyway!! Please you have to stop her!!!!_

**Jonathan: **I'm on my way!

I ditched my Grimmbuster armor as I set it to continue fighting the remaining Grimm in the city as I flew off towards Beacon as fast as possible.

**Jonathan: **JARVIS I need you to access the footage from the vault. Focus on any video with Cinder Fall.

**JARVIS: **Right away Sir.

As the video uploaded I saw Cinder was able to get past my security upgrades. While it did hold her off for a little while in the end she managed to bypass all of it even with only a fraction of the power she had stolen.

**Jonathan: **Damn it, JARVIS full power to thrusters now!!!!

As I continued to speed up I finally made it to Beacon and I was able to find Pyhrra doing her best to hold her own against a Maiden.

**Jonathan: **STAY AWAY FROM HER!!!!!!

As I propelled myself forward I began blasting Cinder with everything I had. She was using her new abilities to easily dodge my attacks while retaliating with her own. The room was filled with fire and repulsers constantly being blasted throughout the damaged room as the two of us began flying around trying to gain an advantage over the other.

**Cinder: **So the Knight has decided to honor me with his presence. I didn't think that the two of us were ever going to have a chance to meet one another personally, yet here you are of your own free will, and about to perish by my hand.

**Jonathan: **Sorry but I have no intention of dying today. I don't care how strong you think you are. I plan on taking you down right here, right now!

As I rushed towards her she shot a stream of flames at me, I formed a shield to block her attack that I reinforced using hard light and ice dust to better handle the intense heat. After that I fired my homing missiles as she flew around the room destroying each one.

**Jonathan: **Pyhrra you have to get out of here right now!!!

**Pyhrra: **No I'm going to stay and fight with you.

**Jonathan: **You don't understand, if you stay you're just going to...

**Pyhrra: **I know if I stay I could die, but if that is to be my fate then so be it!!!

I couldn't understand why she refused to leave. As soon as Cinder made it to the ground Pyhrra began to attack her again. No matter what she continued to fight with all her strength, I knew that she was strong but... I couldn't take the risk.

**Jonathan: **JARVIS, activate Rescue Protocol.

Just as Cinder was about to stab Pyhrra in the torso with a spear made of fire a surge of electricity began to cover Pyhrra as it managed to hit Cinder causing her to jump back. When it dissipated nanotech began covering Pyhrra's body in a blue and gold armor until she was outfitted in Rescue Armor.

**Pyhrra: **What's happening? What is this?

**Jonathan: **Sorry Pyhrra, but it's time for you to go.

The Rescue Protocol was designed to get Pyhrra as far away from here as possible, I modified the suit so her semblance would be useless against it if she tried to manipulate it to her advantage.

**Pyhrra: **Wait stop!!!! Jonathan let me go!!!!!

As the armor began flying away I began fighting against Cinder once again. I had to use everything in my disposal if I wanted a chance at beating her, no matter what I threw at her she somehow made it to get past me, I had to finish now otherwise I would run out of options.

**Cinder: **Is this all the great Jonathan Stark has to offer? I expected you to be more entertaining than your brother, but I guess I had nothing to worry about in the end.

As she kept her focus on me I called in all my armors to fly towards my location for an all out attack. I started attacking her with hand to hand combat hoping I could distract her long enough until my suits arrived. Unfortunately she was really good at this and my counter measure program could only do so much to help me.

**Cinder: **You know it doesn't have to be like this, you're supposed to be one of the Maidens champions, so why not simply join us. With someone of your intellect on our side we can easily overpower anyone that stands against us.

**Jonathan: **Tempting. But I promised to help keep the innocent safe, besides I could never work for someone like you.

At that moment my armors finally arrived and began an onslaught of attacks that kept Cinder busy. As she flew around trying to avoid as many of the blasts as possible I backed away as I tried to catch my breath.

**Jonathan: **JARVIS... give me a status update.

**JARVIS: **Sir it would appear that most of the citizens have escaped the city and managed to find refuge. However there are multiple reports of casualties and there are still a large number of people missing.

**Jonathan: **What about the military robots? They should've shut down when my virus was installed.

**JARVIS: **They did, however an external link had a back up program enabled in case they were shut down prematurely, the coding matches what was used to take over the CCT earlier today.

Great so Cinder was already a step ahead of me this whole time. As I looked above me I saw Cinder getting an advantage as she created her dual blades with her semblance and heated them up in order to easily slice up my armors. I decided to get back into the fight and began harnessing lightning and ice dust into my gauntlets to see if I could cause some damage.

**Jonathan: **Take this!!!

As I fired my repulsers at her she managed to block most of it with a fire shield and returned fire with several fire balls all being shot at me at high speed. As I tried maneuvering out of the way many of my armors that weren't destroyed gave me cover by firing blasts that destroyed any fire balls that where still chasing me.

**Cinder: **Do you honestly believe that you have the power to stop us! Now that I have become the next Fall Maiden our plans are one step closer to being realized, just what do you hope to accomplish by standing in our way!!!

**Jonathan: **All that matters is making sure people like you are stopped, no matter how much you try and bring us down we'll keep fighting back!!! That's what it means to be a hero!!!!

As we kept clashing I started to feel a familiar sensation course through me, my thoughts became more aggressive with every hit we took.

**Ultron: **It would seem as though you haven't learned your lesson yet, no matter how much you try to fight back there will always be someone far stronger than you.

**Jonathan: **( Just shut up! I don't need you so get out of my head! )

All of a sudden I found myself in a dark void, everywhere I looked I saw nothing but emptiness in every direction.

**Ultron: **I once told you that unless you allow yourself to let go of these trivial human matters than you won't be able to evolve into a higher being.

He then suddenly appeared in front of me and steadily hovered towards me.

**Ultron: **Do you truly wish remain inferior to everyone around you?

**Jonathan: **Shut up!!!! I won't allow you to trick me, just stay out of my way and never come back!!!

Suddenly I felt the void shake as an image appeared beside us. The image showed Cinder pinning me to the ground with her hand around my throat. Her free hand was ignited and was ready to deliver the final blow. As I tried to figure out what just happened I suddenly felt like my left arm was impaled, I looked at it and saw my arm become like Ultron's.

**Ultron: **If you won't take the necessary steps to secure victory than I have no choice but to take matters into my own hands.

He snapped his fingers then I received a notification from JARVIS saying that the Rescue Protocol has shut down and that Pyhrra was given full control of the armor.

**Jonathan: **What did you do!?

**Ultron: **"I" didn't do anything. This was all your doing Stark. I am a part of you, the part that understands that necessary sacrifices are all means to an end, the part of you that will do what must be done for victory to be assured.

The image then showed Pyhrra flying in and blasting Cinder, while she kept her busy using both the armor and her regular weapons I tried to retract my armor but I couldn't, the left arm of my physical body started to turn like what happened in my mind. As the battle continued I wanted to tell Pyhrra to run away, to get out of here before she got killed. Before I could say anything Cinder managed to hit the armors arc reactor causing it to shut down and Pyhrra fell in front of me, as I tried getting up I felt an intense pain course through my mind. Pyhrra tried getting up to help me but unfortunately Cinder got to her first, she formed her bow and arrow and managed to injure Pyhrra exactly as she did before, the armors defenses were completely useless thanks to her enhanced abilities, she then grabbed Pyhrra's helmet and easily ripped it off before holding her by the shoulder with a blade ready to finish her off.

**Cinder: **It's unfortunate that you were promised a power that was never truly yours. But take comfort in knowing that _I _will use it in ways you could never have imagined.

Pyhrra simply looked at Cinder in the eyes without the slightest bit of fear.

**Pyhrra: **Tell me, do you believe in destiny?

**Cinder: **Yes.

Just before the blade made contact I thought I heard Pyhrra say " thank you " to me. When she was struck down she didn't even make a sound as her body began to disintegrate as Cinder used her powers on her, the only thing left behind of her was her headband. That was the last straw, I felt my body writhing in pain as it felt like I was being taken over, outside my mind my armor began to change as well. The entire left half began to change as my control over my own body began to dwindle. Cinder then made her way towards me in an attempt to kill me, but before she could finish me off I fired an intense blast of energy at her torso that sent her crashing to the other side of the room.

**Cinder: **So you still have some fight left in you Stark?

My body got up slowly, my mind and my armor were slowly being corrupted by something deep within me, something out of my control. My eyes glowed red as he began to take over.

**Ultron: _There is no more Stark. Now there is only... Ultron!_**

As my body continued to fight Cinder on the outside I tried fighting back to regain myself on the inside. My mark began to burn and I felt incredibly heavy, no matter what I did Ultron was already prepared and I couldn't get past his defenses.

**Ultron: **You only delay the inevitable, your resistance is admirable but foolish.

He surrounded me in a force field that soon exploded that sent my flying high up only to grab me and throw me back down hard enough to make a crater the size of a car.

**Ultron: **This is the only way to achieve true victory, once Ms. Fall has been slain I will ensure that this world will find true peace once all submit to my rule.

**Jonathan: **N-No...

I tried getting back up but I was in too much pain to properly move, most of my body had already been converted into Ultron's likeness except for the right half of my chest and face as well as my right arm.

**Jonathan: **I... won't let... you...

**Ultron: **You're just like all the others. You cannot see that your very existence is the sole reason why your species is on the verge of extinction.

He jumped into the crater and began beating me as I tried using my only free arm to defend myself.

**Ultron: **You can never hope to defeat someone in your state, no matter what you try everything you and the rest of your kind have built will all be destroyed. There is no other choice but to abandon your humanity, it only holds you back!!!!

Before the next hit could connect I was able to grab it and I began to hold it back. I slowly started getting up, I was tired of this, the reason I came here to Remnant was because I felt like the person that I was told was coming with me was my brother. He can be too nice for his own good, still if anything he was always ready to put his trust in others and I was no different. He was depending on me and I wasn't about to let him down!!!

**Jonathan: **You say that all we have built is about to be destroyed... but that's the thing about us humans, we can always rebuild!!!

As I got back up my arc reactor began to glow brighter as the rest of my body began to reform my armor, however that wasn't the only change happening within me. As my body continued to fight Cinder she was quickly put on the defensive, Ultron was beginning to overwhelm her as she realized that what she was fighting was the furthest thing from human.

**Cinder: **This is impossible, how can you keep going like this. You were brought here by the Maidens themselves, you should be a slave to the fate they have set before you!!! So why do you continue to resist!!!!

**Ultron: _I __am a slave to no one. Fate is only a four letter word to me. For you see Ms. Fall, there are no strings on me._**

Cinder increased her power, she surrounded herself in an aura of flames as she formed her twin blades and retaliated with incredible speed and precision, but no matter how much she tried to fight back it was nothing compared to a cold engine of logic like Ultron.

**Ultron: _Struggle all you like Ms. Fall, you are about to reach the end of your meaningless existence soon enough._**

My body was able to trap her in an energy field infused with gravity dust to keep her immobilized before reforming the left arm into my mini rail gun like before and pointed it straight at her.

**Ultron: _Corona Destroyer._**

The blast was more than powerful enough to obliterate the remaining walls of Ozpin's old office and any flying Grimm that just so happened to be in the area. Cinder should've been completely destroyed by that but somehow she managed to survive with several bruises and burn marks around her body.

**Ultron: _It would seem you aren't as frail as the rest of the organics that taint this world. I suppose that I should stop holding back._**

As my body prepared to end her something began to happen to the part of me that had been overtaken by Ultron, cracks began to form and my body began to react as if some invisible force was attacking it.

**Ultron: _No you fool!!! Stop this at once!!!! I will not... allow someone so weak... to overcome my superior... power!!!_**

**Jonathan: **( I don't care how superior you think you are!!!! You may have taken my body and mind, but my soul is another matter all together!!!!! )

Within my mind I began regaining control of myself once again, my aura began to flare intensely as my armor rebuilt itself piece by piece both in my mind and on my real body. Soon my aura surrounded me and covered me in an outline of Iron Man himself.

**Cinder: **Just what are you!!!!!

**Ultron: **You can't defeat me!!!! I AM ULTRON!!!! I AM YOUR SUPERIOR!!!!!!!

**Jonathan: **And I... am... IRON MAN!!!!!

As we clashed once more I felt myself become one with my body again, Cinder was on the verge of defeat but she still kept coming at me with the intention to kill, so I had to pull out all the stops. As I focused on the fight before me I could see the image of Ultron standing along side by Cinder, it was almost if they were fighting me simultaneously, their moves were perfectly aligned so I used that to my advantage.

**Cinder/Ultron: **WHY WON'T YOU JUST DIE ALREADY!!!!!

**Jonathan: **I CAN'T DIE JUST YET, THERE'S TOO MUCH AT STAKE FOR ME. THAT'S WHY I'LL GO BEYOND MY LIMITS AND SAVE EVERYONE NO MATTER THE COST!!!!!

During our clashes I ended up losing more of my armor, the only thing that remained were my jet boots, gauntlets, and only the right half of my helmet. I was covered in dirt and bruises and my aura was almost completely diminished. Cinder wasn't fairing any better, even with the full power of the Fall Maiden she was still inexperienced. She began to focus the remaining power she had into her palms as I saw Ultron do the same, I only had a little power remaining, even still I focused all of it into my repulsers as well as all the Dust I had left. We charged at each other one last time, as we were about to make contact I retracted my boots and my helmet and formed armor on my arms to better brace myself for the power output.

**Cinder/Ultron: ** THIS IS YOUR END STARK!!!!!!!

**Jonathan: **IT'S ONLY THE END WHEN I SAY IT IS!!! I HAVE TO GO BEYOND!!! PLUS ULTRA!!!!

The resulting explosion was enough to shake the entire foundation of the tower, the sound of our attacks colliding could be heard all the way to the outskirts of the city. Somehow enough of my armor survived to shield me from most of the blast, but I knew I couldn't keep fighting anymore, I didn't have any power left and my aura had completely dropped to zero. Cinder struggled to get herself back up on her feet, but in the end she was still standing, soon her Grimm dragon began to descend as it prepared to defend her if necessary. Soon I heard the sound of someone approaching and Ruby was suddenly standing at the edge of the tower. I could tell by the look on her face that she was surprised by the damage both to the tower and to ourselves. She then made her way towards me to try and defend me as best as possible.

**Ruby: **Jonathan are you alright?

**Jonathan: **For the most part. Listen we need to get out of here. We can't beat her as we are now.

I tried getting up but I was in too much pain to move even a little bit.

**Ruby: **Where's Pyhrra?

I pointed over to some of the debris that landed on top of Pyhrra's headband, when Ruby saw it she began to understand that our friend was no more, we failed to keep her alive.

**Jonathan: **It was Cinder... she was responsible for taking Pyhrra from us.

I didn't feel right having to tell Ruby this, but I remembered that this was the only way we could probably still get out of this situation alive. She dropped her scythe as her head began to pound in pain, that look in her eyes was one of despair and I knew it would be the catalyst for awakening her legendary power.

**Ruby: PYHRRAAAAAA!!!!!**

Her eyes began to glow brightly as we were all consumed by it. As her power began to increase I found myself falling into the darkness. What happened next...

... I don't know.

———————————————————————

**Hey guys it's Cerberus. So I just wanted to let you guys know that this story has one chapter remaining before I take a small break before I start on the next one. I also wanted you guys to know that the next one I write will actually be a combination of volumes 4 and 5 since when I started planning it separately they were both too short so putting them together would make it about as long as this one or so. Also I know you'll have noticed the My Hero Acadamia reference in here, I just wanted to put that here since my brother is a big fan of the series so I put that for his character, it may seem a bit out of place but my brother has supported me and even helped me with suggestions so this was just my way of thanking him for his continued support.( obviously I don't own anything for My Hero Acadamia or RWBY. I only own my personal character. ) Anyway I know I am late saying this but I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and here's to the year 2020!!!! Also I wanted to thank anyone who takes the time to read my stories, I know they aren't as good as some of the others out there but it does mean a lot when someone enjoys it. Take care everyone and let's begin the New Year with a new attitude!!!!!**


	17. Chapter17

**Disassembled **

( Ruby's pov )

I saw nothing but darkness, my whole body felt like a giant bruise, it was a struggle to even open my eyes but eventually I did. Once my eyesight started to clear up I found myself back in my room on Patch. I looked around and saw my dad asleep in a chair next to my bed, as I tried getting up I accidentally woke him up and when he saw that I was awake he came over to check up on me.

**Taiyang: **Ruby! You're awake!

**Ruby: **Ugh... what happened?

**Taiyang: **Your Uncle found you unconscious. He got you out of there though and brought you home safe.

**Ruby: **Wait! Yang! Is she alright!?

He seemed troubled answering that, whatever happened to Yang must've been serious if he was this uncomfortable.

**Ruby: **Wait what about Jonathan, he was up on the tower with me! And Carlos was seriously injured when I saw him!

**Taiyang: **Don't worry they're fine, we tried getting into contact with their family but with everything that was going on we couldn't. I thought it would be for the best to let them stay here until things get settled.

I felt a little relieved to know they were okay, as I talked with my dad a little more he mentioned something about what I did to the giant Grimm just before I blacked out. He said something about me doing a number on it and when I asked what he meant by that he tried to avoid the topic until Uncle Qrow stepped into the room and asked to talk to me privately.

**Qrow: **So, how you feeling?

**Ruby: **Um...I kind of hurt... all over.

**Qrow: **Heh, that makes sense, after what you did.

**Ruby: **You guys keep saying that! That I did something! What are you talking about!?

**Qrow: **What's the last thing you remember?

I focused my thoughts and the last thing that came to mind was finding Jonathan and Cinder at the top the tower, the two of them were badly injured and I asked where Pyhrra was...

**Ruby: **Pyhrra! Is she...?

**Qrow: **She's gone, I'm sorry Ruby. I wish it wasn't true, but it is.

I tried my best not to cry, but I felt my tears escaping anyway. I lost a good friend, we all tried our best to fight back and in the end it wasn't enough. After calming down a bit my Uncle asked me if there was anything else I remembered from back then. I told him that I remembered my head hurting and the next thing I knew I found myself here. He then went on to explain that my eyes are an extremely rare trait. Apparently those who are born with silver eyes are destined to become warriors, they say that a single look from our eyes could instantly kill a Grimm, we were the only beings that the Grimm actually feared.

After finishing up with Qrow I decided to check up on Yang, she was looking out the window. Her right arm was bandaged up and when I got a little closer I could see why dad was nervous to talk about her condition. As I called her name she didn't respond so I thought it would be best if I left her alone until she called me.

**Ruby: **I'm so glad you're okay!

**Yang: **But I'm not. It's all gone, the school, Penny, Pyhrra, and...

As she looked at where her arm used to be I felt really scared for her, I've never seen my big sister like this before and I didn't know what to do or say to even make this better.

**Ruby: **Yang, where are Weiss and Blake?

She then explained that Weiss' father came to take her back to Atlas for her own safety, when I asked about Blake again her mood took a turn for the worse.

**Yang: **She ran! When we got into the city she ran... Sun saw her go.

It didn't make any sense to me, after everything we went through why would she simply run away. I tried to convince Yang that there might have been a reason but she said she didn't care. All she knew was that Blake ran and that was it.

**Yang: **You want to know the worst part? The worst part is that for all her talk about how much she loved Carlos, that she was grateful to have someone like him in her life, when he needs her the most she decided it was better to run away than stay with him!

I didn't think of that, now I was even more confused. It didn't make any sense to me but I felt like this was something to talk about another time. For now Yang needed to collect herself, how long that would take I had no idea but all I could do was wait. I walked out of her room as I made my way to the guest bedroom on the other end of the hall, when I looked inside I saw both Carlos and Jonathan lying in separate beds. They were both covered in bandages and I saw several pieces of different armor on the floor next to Jonathan. I walked over to them and saw that Carlos had several severe looking injuries on his body, Jonathan on the other hand didn't look as bad but I could tell it was still pretty serious. I was so distracted by my thoughts that I got startled when Jonathan started to wake up.

( Jonathan's pov )

My whole body felt like I just got tossed around like a rag doll, as I tried getting up I felt all my muscles screaming for me to stop moving, suddenly I felt someone help me readjust myself so I was sitting up. When I opened my eyes I saw Ruby next to me making sure I didn't injure myself even more.

**Ruby: **Are you doing okay?

**Jonathan: **Ugh... I think so. I just hurt... all over.

As I started to settle down I heard some crying and I saw Ruby trying not to let her tears fall.

**Ruby: **I'm sorry, if I had gotten to you guys sooner... or if I found Mercury or Emerald sooner at the coliseum like you asked... than none of this would've happened.

**Jonathan: **Ruby you aren't to blame for this. The people responsible are the ones to blame. Besides if anything I should've come up with a better plan to stop them. Their blood is on my hands not yours, so stop blaming yourself.

I looked at my hands as I let my emotions show a little, I thought we were prepared for this but in the end we still failed to keep our friends safe, I knew there was no way to change that but I still wasn't ready to quit.

**Ruby: **So what do we do now?

I looked over to my brother who was still unconscious, the injuries we both sustained were pretty bad and I hoped that the two of us would be ready to fight again soon, but I couldn't shake off this weird feeling that it was time we went our separate ways. There was a part of me that told me that we needed to walk our own paths soon, I looked towards Ruby and gave her my answer.

**Jonathan: **For now we rest, we regain our strength and then we move forward.

After talking to her a bit longer as well as thanking her father for allowing us to stay here it got late so I decided to get some sleep. Tomorrow I was going to get busy with a few things if I wanted to be done by the time winter arrives. As I soon found myself lost in my dreams a mysterious figure entered the room through the window. They silently made their way towards my brother as they held his hand and sat down next to him.

( Blake's pov )

I shouldn't be here, of all the places I should avoid this was the place that I needed to get away from. Still when I heard he was here I had to see him before I go. As I made my way to the upper floor of the house I got inside by carefully opening the window and I saw both Jonathan and Carlos asleep. I was so happy to see that the two of them made it out okay. As I made my way towards Carlos I was shocked to see his injuries, they were pretty severe, his bandages were covered in dried blood stains and I saw several bruises littered on his body.

**Blake: **I did this... this is because of me.

If he were awake he would probably tell me that none of this was because of me. But I was the one who got involved with the White Fang...

I was the one who left them rather than try to change them...

I was the one who let others get close to me and they got caught in the crossfire because of it...

This was all because of me. As I sat down next to him I held his hand as I had done so many times before. Even now I could still feel the warmth from his touch, but now it only reminded me of what I put him through. As I let go of him I reached into my backpack and brought out the gift I had been working on for the last several weeks, this was something I planned on giving him when the tournament ended, only now it was going to be my last gift to him, I could only hope he forgives me. As I set it down by the nightstand next to him I take off my bow and wrap it around his left hand. I then take off the necklace he gave me and look at it one last time before placing it on top of his gift.

**Blake: **I won't allow you to be hurt because of me, not ever again.

I looked over at him and brought my face closer to his to kiss him once before I go. Just as I was about to I suddenly stopped... I couldn't bring myself to continue as I felt my tears fall.

**Blake: **I... I can't... I'm sorry...

I grabbed my bag and left, I couldn't stay here anymore. No matter how much it hurt I had to leave. I don't know for how long I ran, all I knew was that I kept running until my legs gave out. As I fell to the ground I couldn't stop crying. I couldn't even give him a proper goodbye, all I could do was run away.

**Blake: **I'm sorry... I hope you can forgive me.

As I got back up I began my long journey alone. My destination... home.

**Blake: **No matter what happens, you'll always be my Amazing Spider-Man.

( Ruby's pov )

It's been a few months and the snow has finally fallen over all of Patch. Over the last several weeks Jonathan has been busy over in my dads old shed working like crazy for today. He had converted several of his surviving armor pieces into specialized drones for collecting materials from around Vale so he could rebuild some of lost tech. It wasn't much at first but eventually he was able to make enough to completely rebuild his armor along with something called " 17A ". I had no idea what that was supposed to mean but he said it was something that he thought would help Carlos when he woke up. Right now I was outside waiting with Jaune, Nora, and Ren as we waited for Jonathan to join us.

**Nora: **So Carlos still hasn't woken up yet?

**Ruby: **No, according to the doctor he is physically alright, it's just he isn't waking up mentally.

**Jaune: **I hope he wakes up soon, I know Jonathan must be really worried.

**Ren: **All we can do now is have faith. Until then we have a mission to accomplish.

Soon we saw Jonathan make his way to us and we headed out on our journey. Jonathan said he would stay with us until we reached Vale, after that he would be on his own, I've tried asking him what he plans on doing but he wouldn't tell me anything. He only said that we are each responsible for writing our own stories, mine would be written on this journey and his would be in another. As we continued we could only prepare for whatever or whoever decided to stand in our way, but no matter what we would face it together.

**Salem: **_**How does it feel, knowing that all your time and effort has been for nothing? That your guardians have failed you? That everything you've built will be torn down before your very eyes? Your faith in mankind was not misplaced. When banded together, unified by a common enemy, they are a noticeable threat. But divide them, place doubt in their minds, and any semblance of power they once had will wash away.**_

**Ruby: **No matter how long it takes we _will _make it to the end.

**Salem: **_**Of course they won't realize it at first. Like you they'll cling onto their fleeting hope, their aspirations. But this is merely the first move. So you send your guardians, your Huntsmen and Huntresses, and when they fail and you turn to your smaller soul as well as your champions, know that you send them to the same pitiful demise. This is the beginning of the end Ozpin... and I can't wait to watch you burn.**_

( Normal pov )

There I lay, alone, unable to move without a single idea of what's going on the world around me. My body was beaten, my spirit was somewhat broken. What was next for me I hadn't the slightest idea. As I continued to lay there a small spider crept into the room, it was a small spider with grey eyes that held a sense of wisdom within. It made its way onto my body and began to weave its web. Soon several more spiders followed along as they were wrapping me tight. A voice tried calling out to me in the hopes that I would heed their call.

**????: **Your journey is not yet done young one. It is time you face the truth and should you mend your broken spirit you will regain that which you have lost. We will meet in due time, for now you must rest and soon we shall see if you are worthy of the name Spider-Man.


End file.
